Disclaimer – I do not own the Vampire Diaries or any of it's amazing characters.
Author's Note – Thank you for the wonderful reviews! They are so much fun to read and I love hearing your thoughts about this story. Again, thanks to the always awesome pandora03, whose notes about this chapter are still making me chuckle.
Damon stood there, frozen, arms hanging limply at his sides as Katherine kissed him. He had dreamed of their reunion a thousand times, but now that it was upon him, his fantasies had coalesced into his worst nightmare. She was here. In Elena's kitchen. Which meant, not only did she know about Elena, she had access to her home.
Katherine stepped back and regarded him keenly. "You don't seem very pleased to see me," she pouted. She clasped her hands behind her back and circled the body on the floor. "I was expecting a more enthusiastic reaction." Her tone had become playful, but Damon could sense the warning beneath her words.
Treading carefully, he kept his voice neutral and face expressionless. "What are you doing here, Katherine?"
"In Mystic Falls?" Her eyes narrowed and she cocked her head to the side. "Or in Elena's house?"
Fear sliced through him at the sound of Elena's name on her lips. "Both."
She resumed her circuit around John's corpse. "I received a very interesting call from Isobel. She seems to be under the impression that you're in love with her daughter." Her eyes were focused on him with laser precision, gauging his reaction. "I told her that couldn't possibly be true, that you'd always been devoted to me," she finished with a smile.
She left the kitchen and walked into the living room, Damon trailing behind her, his body coiled with tension. "Naturally, I was curious about the human girl who had captured the attention of my boys." Katherine picked up a framed picture of Elena and her mother. She inspected it briefly, her lovely features contorting into a moue of maliciousness. "After all, we're practically twins," she spat, and set the picture down forcefully, cracking the glass.
Attempting to divert her focus from Elena, he asked, "Where have you been? Why didn't you ever try to find me?" His words were clipped and his tone was sharp. "Or let me know you were safe?" Anger crept into his voice. "I've spent the last one hundred and forty-five years thinking you were rotting in that tomb, and you were free the whole fucking time!"
Her eyes blazed with fury. "You have no one to blame for that but yourself!" Stepping close to him, she seethed with barely leashed rage. "I spent months planning everything – a future with you and Stefan. Only to have it destroyed because you two couldn't stop fighting over me like children!"
Incredulous, he crossed his arms over his chest and shot back at her, "I never signed on to be part of some unholy threesome, Katherine. I wanted you." His voice was hard as he leaned down, his face inches from hers, as he ground out, "The last thing I wanted was to spend eternity sharing you with my little brother." She didn't respond and he searched her face for any signs of regret or remorse. There was none. Nothing had changed; she was exactly the same as she'd always been – selfish, reckless and cruel. He hadn't realized he'd still been holding on to an ounce of love for her until the soulless look in her eyes killed it stone dead. Taking a deep breath, he stepped back and returned to the task at hand. "You still haven't told me what you're doing in Elena's house."
Making her way back to the kitchen she kicked at John's torso with a booted foot. "I had business to attend to. He had become a liability." Seeing the viscera and blood on her boot, she released an irritated sigh and ran it over his trousers to wipe it off. "He killed Pearl without my authorization." When it was clean, her heel came down hard on his lifeless leg, snapping his femur with a loud crack. "And I needed her help," she sniped at the mangled body beneath her foot.
Damon saw the bag that held Elena's Founder's Day dress lying over the back of a chair. She had obviously been watching them since she knew where to get the dress. The thought of her lurking and plotting against him made him want to plunge a stake through her chest. He suddenly remembered Jenna and wondered if there was another body waiting to be discovered upstairs. "How did you get inside?" He lounged against the wall, adopting a deceptively casual stance.
She shrugged. "Elena's aunt was kind enough to invite me inside." She saw Damon's eyes flick towards the stairs. "She's not home. She left before the fun started." Katherine picked up one of John's severed fingers from the pool of congealed blood on the counter and regarded the appendage with cool detachment, her attention focused on the ring. She slid the ring off and held it under the faucet to rinse off the gore before she slipped it in her pocket and tossed the finger aside. Leaning against the sink, she mirrored his posture and crossed her arms. With a malevolent smile, she said, "Now, I can come and go as I please. Spend time with her brother, her aunt…..and of course Elena herself."
Damon's spine stiffened at her implied threat. "What do you want, Katherine?"
The smile dropped from her face and she pushed off the sink. "A couple of things actually. I need a witch. I figured who better than Emily's descendant?"
Damon laughed bitterly. "Bonnie? There's no way in hell she'll ever help you."
"Everyone has their price, Damon."
He shook his head at her arrogance. "Not her. She'd sooner kill you than help you."
She glared at him. "I'm sure I can find a way to persuade her." She pressed against him and placed her hands on his chest. "And…I want you to end this," she waved her hand dismissively, "infatuation with Elena. You know that girl is nothing more than a placeholder – a pathetic imitation of who you really want." Her arms twined around his neck and using her superior strength, she pulled his head down to her mouth.
Their lips met and he kissed her back automatically; the movements of his mouth were dispassionate. Clinical. Damon knew the score; he knew she didn't really want him. John had killed her ally and he was nothing more than a convenient replacement. He knew that seeing him with Elena had bruised her ego and her vanity demanded that he give her up. Since his mind wasn't engaged in the act of kissing her, he began to formulate a plan. He didn't want her anywhere near Elena. He had seen the violence in her eyes when she looked at Elena's picture. Katherine wouldn't hesitate to kill her competition if given half a chance.
Mistaking his participation in the kiss for his acquiescence, she pulled away from him and patted him on the chest like an obedient puppy. "I'll need your help with the witch." Favoring him with a deviant smile, she continued, "Knowing you, I'm sure you've already identified her weak spots."
He pulled her back into his embrace and kissed her softly under her ear, just the way she had liked so many years ago. She shivered in his arms and he smirked. Some things never changed. Feeling her go limp, he asked softly, "What do you want with Bonnie?"
"I need her to help find the vampire who turned me."
Damon pulled back to look at her. "Klaus? Why?" She tensed and Damon knew he had over-stepped his boundaries
Extricating herself from his embrace, she headed for the front door. "I have to go." She nodded in the direction of the kitchen. "You'll clean that up, won't you?" She walked out the front door without a backwards glance. "I'll be seeing you soon."
Damon fumed momentarily before springing into action. He stripped John's body of anything valuable and unceremoniously dumped him in the woods. Maybe it would look like a mugging gone wrong. It was uncharacteristically lazy on Damon's part, but he was pressed for time.
Back at Elena's, he made quick work of cleaning the kitchen. Satisfied that there were no visible traces of the brutal attack, he went upstairs and tore through Elena's room. He found a small duffel bag filled it quickly, providing her with a few changes of clothes. Looking around her room to see if he had missed anything, he spotted her diary and shoved it in the bag as well.
Needing a moment to compose himself, Damon slumped on her bed and raked his hands through his hair. Running was the only option. He didn't give a fuck about the vengeance that Katherine would wreak when she discovered his deception. All he cared about was Elena. He just got her. It may have been monumentally selfish, but there was no way he could let her go. Even if it would be for her own good, Damon knew they were far stronger together than they would be apart. This was the only way. Resigned to his decision, he left Elena's house and sprinted home.