A/N a.k.a Bonnie's foreword: Thank you for your reviews keenan24 and tashasparkle. Your encouragement gave me fuel for more!
CHAPTER ONE
A FEW WEEKS EARLIER IN SUNNY MYSTIC FALLS...
Bonnie unlocked the front door to the double story house she shared with the older pair of the Parker twins and Freya Mikaelson. She'd been away for a little over two weeks spending quality best friend time with Caroline Forbes at her father's fishing cabin in Crabtree Falls three hours away. They sunbathed, read various magazine columns on how to jumpstart your flailing life, went canoeing, hiking and made it their fourteen day mission to make up for lost time. They'd been separated for two years by family problems, doppelgänger concerns and inexplicable death. They needed the break. The trip itself had been refreshing, allowing them a chance to have a long chat about everything, to laugh and take a nostalgic jog down the memory lane. It hurt, it brought up insecurities and struggles, but it gave them the strength needed to get back to reality.
"Honey, I'm home!" Bonnie called out as a warning in case one or both of her exuberant flat mates were walking around naked. She'd been scarred enough times to know she needed to be cautious – no matter the time of day.
No answer.
Jo was undoubtedly at the hospital. Not that Bonnie saw her much, anyway. In her free time Jo taste-tested cupcakes, read up on 'how to raise twins, get married and keep an ex-hunter on the straight and narrow' self-help guides and rescued stray pups from animal shelters. As if on cue, one such sprightly fur ball scampered into the foyer, tail wagging in greeting, an oversized Dorito's packet covering one half of his mouth.
"Drop it!" Bonnie chastised immediately, adopting her best mom tone and an equally firm finger. He swished his tail and took off. Bonnie shut the front door behind her, shrugged her clothes bag from her shoulder and dashed after Bonster, chasing him across the foyer and into the living room. She zeroed in on him as he tried to duck under a couch for cover, pulling him back by his tail, wrestling the trash from his between his teeth afraid he'd choke on the wrapping. He wriggled in her arm, sniffing the empty packet in her hand, slobbering on her fingers in hopes of getting the last of the crumbs. She set him down with a bit of strain and scowled when she noticed the overturned living room she was standing in.
There was a large keg placed against the far wall, CD's littering the coffee table and pushed to in front of their radio, shadowed by a half dozen or so empty glasses and colorful streamers. The place was a wreck, a meager replica of one of the very first frat parties she'd been to on campus a few months before she died for the umpteenth time. It was only when she noticed the bright oversized moustache and red devils horns drawn on one of her father's pictures—on the family wall—that she exploded.
Bonnie ripped the picture from its elected spot, rubbing the glass with the sleeve of her sweater, livid when she realized that the perpetrator had gone beyond the frame and straight onto the image itself.
Good thing she had a duplicate.
She set the crumpled chip packet down on the top of the TV stand and headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time.
She checked Freya's room first. Her bed was made, her room spotless and unlived. Not that Bonnie assumed Freya had much to do with the mess as she barely had friends outside of the three of them. But then again, Bonnie could be wrong. Freya acquired a herbal shop to keep herself busy, something she tended to at all hours of the day. Who knew who she spoke to and how things were going? They hadn't caught up and talked for a while.
Bonnie burst through Kai's bedroom door next, expecting to find him temporarily dead to the world. He spent most his days at home, went out every other night and usually holed himself away to watch movies, play video games and everything you wouldn't expect from someone who'd escaped an eighteen year prison sentence. Why he even chose to stay in Mystic Falls when he had the chance to roam the world at his leisure—and enjoy it—was beyond her. But he did. And he appeared to be content.
Bonnie stood slightly open-mouthed and mute, watching as Kai's recognizable backside thrust into some unknown brunette – one that looked extraordinarily like Shelley Hennig. Not that she could properly tell in this light, but there had been a brief glimpse of her pleasure filled face. They seemed oblivious to her presence, unaware they were being studied or that their twosome had soared to threesome. Kai's eyes snapped open to contradict her thought and locked gazes over his shoulder with Bonnie's, an indecipherable smile touching the corner of his mouth. He didn't stop, didn't say anything and instead became more enthusiastic—or so it seemed from her frozen standpoint—in his keen rhythm, his companion's moans growing louder and more obnoxious. Bonnie quietly backtracked as if she hadn't been caught red-handed, hadn't been standing there gawking at the two like some nauseating voyeur. She shut the door behind her, trembling with a combination of anger, humiliation and a hint of arousal. She didn't know which she felt stronger and which upset her more.
She stomped her way back downstairs, grabbed her bag from the foyer and headed to her room to collect her running shoes, wasting no time in pulling them on and heading back out.
She returned eight hours later. A little before nine PM.
Gratefully, when she walked back into the house, all was quiet and no one else appeared to be home. Kai must have gone out with his floozy. Freya and Jo were still at their individual jobs or doing something else. She spent the next hour cleaning the living room, cooking up some food for Bonster and sorting through her camping clothes. They'd only visited a laundry mat once on their time out there.
Kai returned sometime before midnight and found Bonnie on the basement floor opposite the machines surrounded by a piles of clothes, his and hers alike, a book on her crossed thighs and a beer on the floor beside her.
"Hungry?"
Bonnie looked up from her open book with a glower.
"No," she answered, dismissing him as she glanced back down at her lap. He didn't move, a slice of pizza in one hand a paper towel in the other. His eyes were burning a hole into her head. "Do you mind? You're making it hard to concentrate."
"Your hair's longer," he pointed out as if he hadn't heard the frustration in her tone. "I like it."
"It's called a weave," she retorted offhandedly, dismissing his compliment. He paid no mind and silently devoured his slice of pizza. She read the same sentence five times. The machine beeped, voicing its finalization. Bonnie slipped her bookmark between the pages, snapped the book shut, took a large gulp of her beer and finished it off before she stood.
Kai watched her transfer the clean dry clothes to the basket, the wet ones into the dryer and another dirty pile into the washing machine.
"Are you going to stand there gawking at me all night or offer me a hand?"
He arched a brow as if to ask 'what now' and saw her gesture to the new fabric softener on the top shelf in the open cupboard above the washer. It wasn't impossible for her to reach, but he suspected she wanted to give him something to do.
"Why are you even doing this now? It's late. Shouldn't you be out getting trashed?"
"I'm not eighteen anymore."
"You're not dead anymore, either," he said as he walked up behind her, unmindful of the way her body stiffened as he pressed himself up against her, his left hand rested on top of the counter for support, caging her in as he stretched to reach for the new bottle. Bonnie, too, gripped the counter with one hand, feeling a pulse of anticipatory heat shoot through her at the nearness, a brief image of his earlier activities springing to mind. For a split second, she could even imagine herself in the wonder girl's place. Dammit!
"Anything else I can do for you?" he asked in a tone belying her innocent request and giving more life to her wayward imaginings as he settled the bottle down in front of her.
"Yeah," Bonnie said, glad her voice hadn't failed her as she elbowed him, forcing him to back away and herself to release her death grip on the white counter top. "Personal space. Practice it."
"I've had space enough to last me a lifetime," Kai said, flashing her a charming smile as she turned to him. Pity such a handsome face had to have such murderous tendencies.
"Where's Freya?"
"Freya?" he asked, his brows arching slightly in confusion.
"Our roommate."
He rolled his eyes. He hated Bonnie's topic changes. "She's gone."
"Obviously. But where?"
"New Orleans."
"To do?"
"Do I look like her babysitter?"
Bonnie undid the new bottle cap, pouring the stipulated measure of liquid into the machine as needed, and turned it on. She closed the washer door, collected her plastic glass and headed out. Kai picked her book up off the floor, smiling as he eyed the title, and followed her.
"So how do you like it?" Kai asked as he followed her into the living room, watching her refill her beer from the Keg his fuck buddy Marie arranged the night before. The party had been her idea.
"Like what?" she asked only a touch interested and wishing he was somewhere else. Or not.
"Mister Mercedes."
"Brady is fucked up."
Kai smirked. "Seems more like misunderstood to me."
Bonnie scoffed. "He needs therapy and a straightjacket."
"Or a self-righteous witch to keep him on the right set of tracks."
Bonnie didn't care to read into the comparison and turned away from him, sipping at her beer, scooping Bonster off the floor as she headed for the stairs.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"Bed."
"But it's only eleven!"
"And?"
"I'm not going to chase you around this house, Bennett."
"I never asked you to."
Kai followed her up the stairs, eyeing her back and the sway of her hips.
"You seem upset," he said once he reached his bedroom door. "I would have thought your vacation with your blonde vampire bestie would have put you in better spirits."
Bonnie paused as she neared her own room, turning back to regard him, her eyes narrowing. "I'm fine."
Kai stared at her, his lips curving knowingly. "You look it."
"I am it."
Bonnie inhaled, far more soundly than she realized as she stepped inside her bedroom.
"So you're F.I.N.E. Fucked up, insecure, neurotic and emotional."
Bonnie set Bonster down just other side her bedroom door, glancing over her shoulder as Kai disappeared into his. She could feel herself getting angry again. Of course she was angry! Didn't she have a right to be? She made her way back down the hall, sliding into his room uninvited a second time that day, ignoring the fact that in the few seconds it had taken her to cross the hallway he'd already shed his jacket, unbuttoned his shirt, and made himself comfortable in front of his laptop. As if she needed to see any more of his skin today! It was bad enough she had his sculpted backside imprinted on her mind's eye.
"You want your book?" he asked without looking up from the screen he was logging into. "By the TV."
Bonnie continued to glare at him.
"At first I thought Damon might have upset you. But I'm assuming you're pissed at me?" He pushed away from the desk, using his legs to spin himself around in his chair to face her.
"Why would I be pissed? What do I have to be pissed about?"
He took all of a second to think about it. "I didn't know you were coming home today. It's not like we have a roster. What, you were expecting a parade or something?"
"No, I was expecting you to at least have your pants on!"
Kai arched a brow, "You've lost me."
"This is my house."
"And this is my bedroom, what's your point?"
"My point is…. Is… that I live here, too, and I don't appreciate—"
An amused smile twitched at the corner of his mouth, a look of perceptive mischief in his eye.
"You know what—forget it…"
Bonnie stormed off, collected her book off the adjacent dresser beneath the mounted flat screen TV, and headed for the bedroom door where all of a sudden she bounced off thin air. She winced as she did, dazed by the unexpected propulsion.
"Let me out of here right now."
"You came to me, remember? Twice. The first time you ran away as if scalded."
"I didn't run," she defended, feeling her cheeks flush as his eyes dropped to her sneakers and sportswear she was currently adorning. "Not… in the way you mean—"
"Sure," he answered, not at all believing her.
Bonnie said nothing more and turned upon the door a second time, assuming that was it and he'd screwed with her for a second. She tried the doorway again. She still couldn't go anywhere.
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Waiting," he said, fluidly turning himself around to his laptop again.
"For what?" Bonnie asked sounding annoyed again, her eyes trained on his back.
"For you to admit that you're jealous."
"Wha—jealous? Me?"
Kai half turned to look at her, challenging her, optimistic that he'd seen the reflection of such an emotion in her eyes that morning or maybe he was just hopeful.
"I'm not jealous," she repeated beneath his silent scrutiny, drawing out the words as if he were slow.
Kai continued to stare at her in silence.
"I don't even like you. I tolerate you."
He scoffed. They both knew that was bullshit. Maybe in the past, but now, things had changed drastically. She fell asleep with him on the sofa, made out with him once or twice, and even allowed him to grope her. That, of course, had happened months ago, but still – it had happened.
"You wound me, Bonnie," he said, clutching at his heart in faux pain.
"Perfect," Bonnie snapped, tapping at the barrier. "Then let me go."
"If I could, I would have done so months ago."
"You seemed to be doing that quite enthusiastically from where I was standing."
Kai grinned. Ah-ha!
"Barrier. Down," Bonnie commanded, seeing the recognition in his eyes, kicking herself for her blunder.
"She meant nothing."
"Let me out of here."
Kai turned himself around completely and stood, ignoring her need to leave and how stiff she'd become – how defensive.
"We're not going steady, Bonnie."
"Kai. Let. Me. Out."
"You can't expect me to sit and patiently wait for you while you decide whether or not I'm on par with Damon's redeemable grade. I still have a few more people to murder."
"I'm not doing this… not today, not ever—"
Kai reached for the book, snatching it out of her hand, tossing it toward his unmade bed.
"Cesserimus!" she hissed, wiping the smug look of satisfaction off his face as he stumbled back, a shove that nearly sent him tumbling over his discarded roller chair. He managed to catch himself before landing on his ass.
"Testy."
"Conteram incantatores," Bonnie said even more forcefully, bringing a fist against the barrier. She retried over and over, repeating the incantation until finally turning on Kai again.
That didn't last long. A few broken collectables, a lamp and then unexpected darkness.
