A/N: New chapter! Happy Sunday, everyone! Thanks for reading and your continued support! It's so greatly appreciated! You guys are the best!
The twentieth chapter, in which our heroine sets out on a quest
A gasp of pure terror escaped Elena's throat. Just as you are plunged into darkness and confusion by the blowing of a light bulb, your brain needing a moment to accept the new conditions surrounding you, your eyes needing a few seconds to adjust to the gloom, Elena was plunged into darkness by the disconnection of the phone line. For a moment she wasn't able to speak; her mind and her heart temporarily unable to reconcile what had been reality mere seconds ago with what was reality now. And she was in good company. The room was completely silent. No one dared to voice what needed to be voiced next.
"What did you do?" she finally asked, turning to Mason, fear almost making her inaudible.
Her husband was visibly still reeling from the shock himself, his hands grasping onto the tabletop to steady him. "Elena," he said, his eyes – full of desperation and loss – meeting hers in a plea to find comfort, forgiveness, a solution. But he was only met with endless horror and accusation.
"What did you do?" she asked again, louder, the adrenaline that was pushing through her veins pressing out of her in a yell.
"I'm sorry," he said, his face a reflection of the utter helplessness he felt. "I didn't mean…"
"You killed them, Mason!" Elena exclaimed, panic getting the better of her. "They're going to kill them because of you!" she screeched, lunging for him and letting her hands hit him – uncoordinated, wanting only to hit, not caring about the place or effect.
"Elena," Damon tried to soothe her, lightly grabbing her shoulder from behind.
Mason didn't fight back. He seemed almost to welcome the assault. "He'll call back. We'll pay," he tried to reassure himself as much as his wife.
"He won't call back, Mason," Elena sobbed, her hands still blindly flying at him. "He can't, now."
"Elena," Damon tried again, pulling on her a little more determinedly. "Elena, breathe. You need to breathe."
She was hearing his words but her body was unwilling to listen. As if acting beyond her control, it convulsed, trying to shake him off, needing to break free of his embrace, needing to just keep hitting something, as if her giving up her outburst would mean giving up on her children.
Suddenly the commotion was interrupted by the chiming of Elena's phone. She stilled instantly, all eyes jumping to the small device, hoping against hope that Tyler was calling back after all. The momentary optimism that had rushed a spike of endorphins into her blood stream, making her head spin, was immediately cut short. The caller ID showed Caroline's cell phone number. Elena's body, suddenly spent from being tossed from one extreme sensation to the next, slumped against Damon in defeat. He steadied her, pulling her into his side with one arm, answering the phone with the other.
"Now's not a good time, Caroline," he quietly spoke, while the policemen were gathering at the other end of the table and talking in hushed tones amongst themselves, obviously trying to come up with a new strategy.
"Damon, I really need to speak with Elena," Caroline replied urgently.
"Car, really, not now. Okay?"
"No, I really really need to speak with her now, Damon," Caroline insisted.
"Aren't you still in the hospital?" Damon questioned, wanting to clear his confusion as much as he wanted to protect Elena from the unnecessary phone call.
"Yes. But I really need to speak with Elena. It's important."
"Why?" Damon asked, feeling Elena shudder against him in quiet sobs.
"I can't tell you. Just please, Damon, can you hand her the phone?"
Everything inside him rebelled against the idea but the urgency in Caroline's voice made him reluctantly relinquish the phone to the woman in his arms.
"Caroline, what is it?" Elena asked tiredly, unable to bring herself to care about anything her nanny could say to her right now.
"Can you go somewhere alone?" Caroline asked nervously.
"Uhm, sure," Elena replied and unhurriedly extricated herself from Damon's arms.
"Where are you going?" he whispered, holding onto her arm.
"Just getting some air," she replied quietly before stepping outside and closing the door behind her. "What's going on?" she asked of the woman on the other end of the line.
"Elena, I have Vicki on the phone for you," Caroline announced. "She wants me to put her through to you."
"What?" Elena exclaimed but already heard the click on the line.
"Elena?" she heard her sister in law's voice, unmistakably hers, no metallic distortion.
"Vicki?" she felt her heart race uncontrollably.
"I thought we should talk, us women. The men always make such a mess of things," the other woman said calmly.
"Are my kids okay?" Elena asked hurriedly.
"They are literally having the time of their lives," Vicki reassured her in an inappropriately warm voice. "They've been lounging by the pool all day. You'll get them back perfectly tanned."
"You're giving them back?" Elena asked, trying not to let hope rise inside her but unable to keep it down and out of her voice.
"Elena," Vicki began, sounding almost rueful. "You understand that we can never come back now, right?"
"Yes you can," Elena protested. "I will speak to Mason. I will speak to the police. Nothing will happen to you. I swear. I'll do whatever you want. Anything, Vicki. Please. Anything."
"No. It's over. We can never come back," Vicki reconfirmed her previous claim. "But that's not the point, Elena. We considered the possibility that this might happen. We hoped it wouldn't, but we planned for it. The thing is, since we can't come back, you need to make this worth our while, Elena."
"What do you want?" Elena asked. "I'll pay. Anything."
"See, that's what I thought. Tyler said you'd put up a fight, but I told him you're not your husband. You know what's best for your children and you'll pay without making a fuss."
Elena felt tears crawl into her eyes and tighten her throat. "Anything," she confirmed hoarsely.
"We need the ten million, Elena. We need you to give them to us. We can't go back now."
"I don't have ten million," Elena replied desperately.
"No, but as your husband's wife you have access to certain funds," Vicki elaborated vaguely.
"I don't know how," Elena returned, becoming agitated. She wanted to do everything Vicki asked of her but she felt like she had very restrictive limits.
"We'll tell you," Vicki reassured her in an almost motherly voice. "All you have to do now is pack your bag and go to the airport. There you will retrieve an envelope left in your name at the main information. Inside you will find a fake passport, a ticket in that name and a hotel name. Take the next flight to the ticket's destination and check into the hotel of that name at the airport. You will get further instructions once you get there."
"Where?" Elena asked.
"See, Elena, we don't want anyone to know. So what you will do is not tell anyone, go to the airport and take that flight no questions asked. Got it?"
"Yes," Elena confirmed quickly, not wanting to jeopardize her children's safety any further.
The call was immediately disconnected and Elena stood in the hallway, immobilized by dread for a second. She wasn't sure she could do this. Go God knew where by herself, impersonate a stranger, face Vicki and Tyler. She felt too small and too weak. But a memory flashed into her mind, of Jenna smiling up at her with big, hopeful eyes and of Jeremy, running towards her on the beach, arms spread wide, waiting for her to catch him and scoop him up. And she realized that it didn't matter. It didn't matter how weak she was or how scared, it didn't matter how much she could do, how far she could go, she had no choice. She would have to take that flight, she would have to do what Vicki and Tyler asked of her and she would have to be strong for her kids. Being weak, being afraid, giving up, it just simply wasn't an option.
She took a resolved breath and returned to the commotion in the library. Captain Grant was on the phone with Italian police, following their progress as they raided and searched the hotel – so far to no avail.
"What's going on?" Damon asked her, his eyes inspecting her thoroughly.
"Nothing, she just…" Elena took a deep breath. She hated having to lie to him but she had no other choice. "Caroline remembered something that brought her to the conclusion that Tyler was the one who attacked her. But we already knew that, so…"
"Why did she need to speak with you and not me?" he questioned, his brow furrowed inquisitively.
"I don't know," Elena returned noncommittally, wanting this conversation to be over.
"Well what did she remember?" Damon continued. "Maybe it'll be helpful."
"No, it was just… she remembered the smell of his aftershave." Elena wasn't sure if what she was telling Damon sounded at all believable but her mind wasn't able to come with anything better at the moment. "I'm really exhausted, Damon. I'm going upstairs for a moment, okay? Can we talk about this later?"
Damon stared at her for a second, his eyes seeing right to the very core of her like they always did, but while Elena usually liked the way he could always read how she felt, it terrified her now. She was afraid that she might not be able to hide this from him. That with that one, insistent look he would discover everything she was trying to conceal. But she couldn't give up hope that she might be able to fool him just this once.
"Are you sure?" he asked, his eyes boring into hers, watching even the tiniest reaction.
"Yeah. I just need a minute," she reassured him with what she hoped was an honest looking smile. She turned around to leave, to escape his scrutiny, to pack.
"Elena," he called her softly, holding her back by her hand again. Reluctantly she turned around and faced him uncertainly. Had he seen her ruse for what it was? Would he call her out on it? "They'll be okay," he said warmly, wanting her to see the truth of his words in his eyes. "We'll get them back."
Elena nodded quietly and turned again and this time he let her go. She felt the dread squeeze her heart. He hadn't seen it in her eyes. He hadn't understood. She was as thankful as she was terrified that she was, after all, all on her own.
Ten minutes later she climbed out the guest room window, her cell phone and charger in her purse, assuring her continued reachability. Anything else she could buy once she got to where she was going. The key thing right now was to move, to make some kind of progress, to somehow get closer to getting her children back. She had only waited long enough to make sure no one was coming to check up on her. She had waited for the patrolling guards to move around the corner and then used the two minute window she had calculated and dashed across the short slab of neatly manicured lawn before she disappeared through the tall but sparse hedges surrounding the property. Once out on the road, she hurried to get out of eyesight of the house and then hailed a cab, promising the driver an extra big tip if he got her to the airport in under forty-five minutes.
As promised, an envelope was waiting for her at the main information. The clerk handed it to her with a bright smile that aimed to help and to please, not knowing what the small package contained, not understanding what the delivery of it signified. Elena hurried towards the bathroom, not wanting to be surrounded by passing glances that might catch a wandering glimpse of what she had just been given. With shaking hands she locked the stall door behind her and ripped open the inconspicuous envelope. There it was. A fake passport that showed her picture, smiling; the same picture she had used for her real passport that was lying in a drawer in her abandoned mansion. Her picture, her birth date, but a different name – Nina Sommers. She stared at it for a second. Who was Nina Sommers? It didn't matter, she finally decided. Right now Nina Sommers was the woman that was going to save her children. She tucked the Passport into her purse and pulled the airline document from the packet. It was a voucher, valid for a one-way-flight – any time – to Paris.
Elena was sitting in her seat, staring out the window, dusk already starting to settle outside. She'd had to turn off her phone now, but she had been ignoring it for a while, not answering any of the uncountable calls from her husband. They knew she was gone. Damon had probably figured out why and that was why he wasn't calling her. He understood that she wasn't snubbing her husband but doing what needed to be done. She wished she could call him, wanted badly to ask him for help, but she couldn't.
She was on her own. And she had never felt more desperately alone in her life. Not when she had been hiding under her covers as a child, praying the foot steps outside her door would just keep going, not when she had run away from yet another new family, not when she had watched her children play from afar, unable to work up the courage to walk over and join them. In all those instances, the only thing she stood to lose was yet another piece of herself. Now was different. She had built a life now, a life that she loved, filled with people she loved and filled with people who, inexplicably, loved her back, and she stood to lose all of it. And the only person she could turn to in order to fix it was herself. Therein lay her utter loneliness. She was the only one with the power to save everything she cared about and she wasn't sure she was strong enough to do it.
"I thought we weren't leaving each other anymore," she suddenly heard a voice behind her, causing her to whip around in her seat. She was met with striking blue eyes, belonging to the man who had just taken the seat next to her.
"Damon, what…" she began to question, frantically looking around the plane to see if her husband or the police were there as well.
"Don't worry, it's just me," he reassured her.
"You can't be here. They said to come alone," Elena exclaimed, panic rising up inside her. How was he here? How had he found her? What would happen if Tyler and Vicki found out?
"They'll never know I'm here," he replied calmly.
"How can you be sure?" she asked, her mind still racing through possible scenarios. "What if they're watching me?"
"They're not," he reassured her. "I checked with the woman at the information. Your envelope was delivered there by bike messenger the same day Vicki and Tyler left. I also checked the photos of us on the beach. They were all taken on the same day. And Tyler was away for a supposed business meeting on that day. No one was watching us. Tyler came and took the photos. They're rich and they're well equipped and incredibly prepared, but they're on their own, Elena."
She was still uncertain but she was also tempted to give into the relief she felt at seeing him. "How did you find me?" she asked.
"Caroline sounded so upset on the phone. And you're just a really awful liar," he explained with a raised eyebrow. "The minute you walked back into the room, I knew something was wrong. Your questionable explanation only convinced me more that you were up to something."
Elena's eyes dropped to her hands. He had seen right through her after all. She hadn't been able to fool him for even a second. He had known, he had understood and now he was here.
"I saw you leave through the back window. I didn't want to follow you, just in case. But your phone is traceable. Mason and the police agreed that he would stay to keep up appearances and that he would call you in case they somehow hacked into the system. But we all agreed that I would go with you."
Elena finally allowed the sense of safety that always enveloped her when he was around to soothe her frazzled nerves. "I'm glad you're here," she admitted.
"I wasn't going to let you go through this alone," he answered, pulling her to him gently and pressing a soft kiss to her lips.
"They can't know you're with me," Elena replied, panic grabbing at her heart again.
"I know," he confirmed with a reassuring nod. "I will let you do everything by yourself. But I won't let you be alone."
A small, grateful smile rushed across Elena's face. How did he know? How did he always understand? "Thank you," she said, pulling him close again and kissing him once more, gathering strength from the mere fact that he was here, that she wasn't alone after all. Maybe she would be able to do this. Maybe his support and his faith in her would be enough to give her strength she needed to save her children.
A/N: With the last chapter I reached 400 reviews for this fic, which absolutely blew my mind. Thank you guys so so much for sharing your thoughts with me. It's what inspires me and keeps me going. Group hug! xoxo