The morning after the slumber Elena's phone started to ring. Caroline pushed Elena out of bed so we could go back to sleep.
"Go away!" Caroline said. Elena landed on the floor and we tried to go back to sleep.
"Hello?" Bonnie moved the covers from us and we all looked at Elena.
"Shhh." Bonnie told her.
"Elena!" I said and we watched her drag herself out of the room and continued her conversation to the hallway.
"Good and much needed. "When can you and I have one?" she asked the person on the other line. "Okay. Now. Today. Take me far, far away. Because of everything that's going on. Uh, this has everything to do with that."
"I love listening to one sided conversations." I said getting out of bed and getting dressed.
I was walking into the house when Jenna stopped me.
"Hey, Nikky. Could you do something for me?" she asked me.
"Sure, what do you need?" I asked her.
"There's this tea party at the Lockwoods and I was wanting you to come with me." she said and I nodded.
"Sure. Just let me put my things away real quick then we can go." I told her walking upstairs and placing my things in my room. I looked through the bag I'd come home with and found my gun. I made sure I had plenty of bullets, both wooden and real, before I walked back down with it ready to go when I got a text. I looked at my phone to see a message from Care. I put the gun in my waist band at my lower back and read the message.
Where are you? I need to talk.
I'm headed to the Lockwood's for a tea thing then I'll probably head to the Salvatore's to stop whatever plans Damon is making for Elijah. Why? You okay?
"Ready?" Jenna asked me and I looked at her.
"Yea, let's go." I said as my phone went off again.
Never mind, all good. I'll talk to you later.
Okay
At the Historical Society's Tea Party I saw Elijah and Carol speaking with each other as they sipped their tea. I decided to listen into their conversation.
"Have you spent much time in Richmond for your book? There's such a wealth of history there." Carol said.
"No, I'm focusing mostly on the smaller regions of Virginia. Lots of research. Strictly academic." he told her.
"That's fascinating." she said and I saw Damon come int the house. I smiled at him before walking to him as Jenna intercepted him.
"Damon, what are you doing here?" Jenna asked him. Suddenly, Andie Star walked up to us, her notepad in hand. Damon saw her and smiled.
"Hi. You came." Andie said.
"Hi." Damon greeted.
"Hi." she said. He pecked her on the lips and my smile fell.
"Thanks for introducing us, Jenna." Damon said walking away. I followed him as he walked towards Carol and Elijah.
"Damon. Nicole." Carol said coming towards us.
"Carol." Damon said.
"What a surprise." Carol said looking at the two of us. Damon and Carol exchanged kisses on the cheeks and I hugged her. "Hi. Elijah, I want you to meet Damon Salvatore and Nicole Gilbert. Their families are one of Mystic Falls' founding families." Carol introduced us.
"Elijah and I have met already when he came over for my mom's things." I told her as I shook his hand. "It's nice to see you again."
"Such a pleasure to meet you." Damon told him.
"No. Pleasure's mine." Elijah said as the two men shook hands.
I walked with Elijah and Damon as they walked into the study and Damon shut the door behind us.
"What can I do for you, Damon?" Elijah asked him.
"I was hoping we could have a word." Damon told him as I watched the interaction between the two.
"Where's Elena?" Elijah asked turning to me.
"Safe with Stefan." I told them.
"They're laying low, you know, bit of a werewolf problem." Damon told him.
"Oh, yeah, I heard about that." Elijah said glancing at me.
"I'm sure you did since it was your witch that saved the day." Damon said looking between the two of us.
"You are welcome." Elijah told Damon as the younger vampire sat down on the desk.
"Which adds to my confusion on exactly why you're here." Damon told him.
"Why don't you just stay focused on keeping Nicole and Elena safe and leave the rest to me." Elijah told him and moved to exit the room but Damon sped in front of him, blocking him.
"Not good enough." Damon told Elijah. Elijah grabbed Damon by the throat and sped him into a wall close to me.
"Damon!" I cried out as I watched them fight. Damon, in retaliation, grabbed Elijah's throat but Elijah grabbed his hand and pulled it off his throat easily, crushing his hand as he did. "Elijah please!" I begged him. Elijah turned to me before turning back to Damon.
"You young vampires, so arrogant." Elijah said dropping Damon's hand from his own while he continued to hold Damon up against the wall by the throat. "How dare you come in here and challenge me?"
"You can't kill me, man. It's not part of the deal." Damon said, reminding Elijah of his deal with Elena and myself.
"Silence." Elijah told him while grabbing a pencil lying on the desk and stabbing Damon in the neck with it. Damon yelled in pain while clutching at the pencil. Elijah let him go and I started towards him and Elijah sped in front of me, stopping me in my tracks. I watched as Damon fell against the desk and removed the pencil painfully. Damon held his hand over the bloody wound as Elijah whipped out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the blood from his hands. "I'm an Original. Show a little respect." he said holding the handerchief in front of Damon, who grabbed it hastily placing it on his wound. "The moment you cease to be of use to me, you're dead, so you should do what I say. Keep Nicole safe." he said leaving the room. I walked up to Damon and tried to help him apply pressure to his wound.
"Still like your deal with him?" he asked me.
Damon, Alaric and I were sitting in the library. They were drinking bourbon and I had a soda in my hands.
"Today was a bust." Damon said.
"Yeah. How's the throat?" Ric asked him.
"Sore." Damon said.
"Yeah. That Elijah's one scary dude, but with nice hair. Hey. You want another one?" Ric asked him getting up. Damon handed him his glass, which he took and walked over to the bar.
"He's gonna be hard to kill." Damon said and I shook my head.
"You could always just leave him alone." I suggested.
"No, we won't just let you or your sister die for his plan." Ric told me before turning to Damon. "I'd think twice before I'd trust that dagger and some ashes to do the job. You're gonna need more info." he said pouring their drinks.
"I'm out of sources." Damon told him.
"What's up with you and this news chick?" I asked him as Ric came back to us.
"Ooh." Ric handed Damon back his drink and sat down next to me. "She's got spunk, huh?" I looked at my drink before going back to his conversation.
"Just don't kill her, please." Ric begged him.
"If I did, who would report her death?" Damon joked.
"Just don't do it, all right? She's friends with Jenna, and it's bad enough that I'm lying to her about everything else. I hate the lies." Ric said taking his phone out of his pocket to check the time. "Oh, God. I got to go. I got to pick Jenna up. Don't worry. I'll, uh, show myself out." Damon placed his hands on the back of his head and shut his eyes.
"Good luck." Damon said.
"I'm running upstairs for a moment. Pregnancy makes the bathroom a constant requirement." I said smiling at him. I went upstairs but stopped partially when I heard a loud, crashing noise from the hallway. I made my way to where I could see what was going on. From the rafters a man dropped down and with wolf-speed he attacked Damon. I rushed up the stairs as quietly as I could and hid as I listened to the fight.
"Whew! Damn, you're strong. It took the whole syringe." I heard a guy say. "Grab that one. He's dead."
"Hi, Damon. Nice to see you again." I heard a woman say and I recognized it. Jules.
I peaked downstairs to see Alaric's body on the floor in the parlor room and Damon chained to a chair with some kind of collar around his neck. I saw a man holding ends to two chains that were attached to Damon's spiked collar and watched what was about to happen.
"Morning, sunshine." he said walking in front of Damon. "I saw this movie once, some torture porn flick. Anyway, they had this collar device that was really cool, so I just modified it some with some wooden nails, and when I pull..." he pulled on the ends of the chains forward and Damon groaned in pain. Suddenly, I saw Jules in a corner of the room and made sure I still had my gun on me.
"So I hear you have the moonstone." She told him. I heard a noise from behind me and looked but saw no one. I turned back to see Jules and two others, probably werewolves, walk farther into the room.
"Oh, if you only knew the irony of this moment right now. Let me tell you how this is gonna go. You're gonna torture me, I don't talk, someone loses a heart. Last time, it was your boy Mason." Damon told her and she inched closer to Damon.
"This time, it'll be you." she told him and he felt someone grab me from behind.
"Look who we found." They pushed me downstairs and sat me on the couch across from Damon.
"Text Brady and tell him to forget the other one." Jules said smiling at me.
Jules leaned against a shotgun as she talked to Damon.
"You know what the great thing about buckshot is? It scatters through the body, maximum damage." Jules told Damon. He looked at her with feigned intrigue and she lifted the shotgun up and pointed it at him. "Where's the moonstone?"
"Get over it, honey. You're never gonna get it." Damon told her.
"You looking for this?" I looked behind me to see Elijah and smiled. Elijah was leaning against a banister, twirling the moonstone in his hand. He walked down the stairs and placed the moonstone on an end table and backed away. "Go ahead. Take it." One of the wolves sped to rush towards the moonstone, but Elijah, being quicker, plunged his hand into the man's chest and ripped out his heart. After he fell to the ground two other wolves rushed him but he, without any effort, plunged his arms into their chests and ripped out their hearts as well. Elijah walked over to the one who tortured Damon, who crouched down and pulled his jacket over his face in fear. Elijah picked him up from the ground by his jacket. "What about you, sweetheart, hmm? You want to take a shot? Yes? No? Yes? Where's the girl?" Elijah asked us.
"I don't know." Damon told him.
"It doesn't really matter." Elijah told him. He turned and punched the wolf in the face and he fell to the floor. Elijah removed the chains strapping Damon down into the chair. "So you realize this is the third time I've saved your life now?" Damon didn't respond to him as Elijah turned and walked out grabbing the moonstone as he did.
"Did you call him?" Damon asked me.
"No. But I'm glad he showed." I told him.
"Why? Because he's promised to save you?" he asked me.
"No. Because he promised to save my family and my friends." Damon's phone began to ring. He answered it and listened to what the person said on the other end.
"So he planned to kill her all along." he said looking at me. "Got it loud and clear." He hung up and Ric suddenly came back from the dead. "Finally. You missed all the fun." Damon told him as he picked up the chains from the floor as Ric attempted to awaken. When he got himself settled in a chair he pulled out his phone and called Jenna.
"Yeah, sorry. I… I… I've just been grading papers." he said grimacing at the lie. "Honestly, uh... I fell asleep. I'm sorry. Jenna, I'm a jerk. Sorry. Tomorrow I'm all yours, OK? All right. Good night, Jenna." After a short time Ric left and Damon called Stefan and told him what he'd learned about the sacrifice.
"It was straight from the witch's mouth. He was gonna go through with the whole sacrifice. You should probably just keep her away a little longer. Yeah. It's been a day for that." he hung up and looked to me. "Sorry to tell you about your boys deal being broken." I laughed at him.
"You really think that I'd make a deal and not know what was in it? Elijah's very careful with his words. He promised to protect my friends. He never said a word about me." I told him.
"You knew that you weren't gonna survive this?" he asked me.
"I made a separate deal with Elijah. One Elena didn't know about. Elijah waits for the baby to be born the uses me for the sacrifice." I told him and he looked at me shocked.
"What?" he asked me.
"I came home to die. And that's still going to happen." I told him.
"And how do you know he'll keep his end of your bargain?" Dean asked me.
"Because he will wait for as long as he can to protect the child." I told him.
"Why? Is he the father or something?" he asked me sarcastically.
"No. Klaus is." I told him leaving.
