The Vampire Diaries: Out of my Mind (Kindle Worlds Novella) (3 page)

Rebekah is in my head. She has seeped in and I have to find a way to scrub her out.

I miss Elena and the hook misses her, too. Every minute I spend away from her hurts double. But double pain is great, it’s peaches, because it’s triple pain or a gajillion pain if I kill her and that’s all me, no hook. Just crippling, immortal regret.

Twice today I was sitting in my Camaro without warning, keys in hand, ready to drive to her house. Twice I slammed my fist into my thigh, only healed on the outside (you and me both, buddy). Twice I trudged up the porch steps and into the house I didn’t remember leaving. I may staple myself to the couch because there is no way out of this except staying put. I grit my teeth. I will beat this. I haven’t left, I am
still here
, I am nowhere near Elena. One more drink to celebrate small victories.

Eventually the screaming pain will quiet or dull or I’ll get used to it. It is impossible to feel this degree of pain forever and not lose my mind. When it starts to ebb, when it peaks at least, which holy hell let it be soon, then I will determine how to take Rebekah down. I can do it. I am smarter than this. I am the smartest goddamn person I know.

One more glass.

I am lying on Elena’s bed. Fog fills her room from the top down. It spills onto the ceiling of her confined, too-cozy space like an upside down haunted house.

A new dream. No, I refuse. I grab at my arm but I am still here, still in her room, no glass. I can’t wake up. I slap my face, I pinch. Nothing. Rebekah is getting better at this, I am trapped in this dream, but I am getting better at this too, I am a seasoned freaking professional. Hit me with your best shot. I am Captain Willpower.

Elena comes out of the bathroom and now the fog is steam from her shower. She smells like honeysuckle and lilacs, like Virginia Spring, like tramping through the grapes of Southern goddamn wrath before I left the war. She is wrapped in a faded purple towel. See, clearly a dream, Elena never comes out of the bathroom in anything but her tight little PJs. They are too short but I will never tell her because the curve of her ass peeks out of the bottom of them, just a little, just enough to be the sexiest thing she ever wears. But Rebekah doesn’t know that so Elena’s wearing a towel. Her hair hangs in long, wet ropes, not yet combed, but Elena would have combed it in the bathroom already. Rebekah, you are a Neanderthal, my Elena is so much classier than this.

“Damon, what are you doing?” She clamps her arms over her already covered breasts and I test my dream powers by imagining the towel dropping at her feet. No dice.

This one, this particular battle will be about stealing and wielding the upper hand. I come out swinging. “Don’t act surprised. Don’t pretend you don’t want me here.”

“Of course I do, but --”

“I’m not going to be your pin cushion anymore.”

She turns her head, keeps her eyes on me. Rebekah is getting Elena’s special cocktail of hurt and indignation and intrigued, hormonal want just right. Bravo. “I know, Damon.”

“That’s it? That’s all you’ve got?” I have learned how this works. We are making this dream together, Barbie Klaus and I, and I want to drive.

“I wasn’t trying to lead you on.”

“Lead me on? You must be joking. You couldn’t lead a
parade
. You may be cute but you’re a child. You haven’t got the slightest clue how to lead me on.”

“What are you… I don’t understand.”

An opening, great, and now I need a pipe, I get all misty-eyed and I settle in to tell a story. “Now Andie, she knew how to flirt, how to seduce. She roped me good. You remember Andie, don’t you? Legs that went
all
the way up, and she was brilliant, she could actually keep up with me. More than I could ever say for you.” She’s startled. Surprise, I am taking over. “Her tits were… well, you two could duke it out for tits I guess, but she wins hands down for flavor. She tasted like sweet and sour sauce, no joke. She was positively delicious.”

“Get out,” she seethes. Any minute there will be a knife in my gut or I will be drinking her dry. The horrible slurp of the last drops through a straw. Ha. The horrible rattle of Elena’s last breath. I wait, brace myself. Nothing. I keep pushing.

“But your precious Stefan killed her.”

“I know.”

“Thoughtless and inconsiderate don’t begin to cover it. And sure, you weren’t there, but you helped make him back into a killer. Come on sweetheart, take some credit.” I am winning the shit out of this. “Couldn’t you get him back when you had the chance? Why did you give up so easily?”

“I never gave up on him. I still haven’t.”

I erupt. “
Then what are you doing with me
?!”

She wilts onto the bed, wraps the towel around her tighter. She can’t look at me, I am really getting to her, I am penetrating, and now I’m sure that if I break the source then the compulsion will break and I will be free of this and Elena will be safe. I am just getting started.

I pace. I am the inquisitor. I am CSI, NCIS, SVU, I am whatever the acronym is for badass motherfucker. “But it’s really Katherine you should envy. Stefan and I, we pined for her for a century and a half. Both of us, him too, he’d argue with me but I know he did. Stefan was pining for her
while he was screwing you
, I guarantee it. And me? Yeah. She is a hall of fame heartbreaker. You may do torture better, but she could mess with a man’s head and make him thank her for it. She is better than you could ever be in your wildest, dirtiest fantasies.” She is still as a statue. Dead giveaway, Rebekah. Elena would be panting and slapping me. I dig in deeper. “Because she makes you love her. And you wouldn’t
begin
to know how to do that.”

Elena/Rebekah is wide-eyed and crying which means this is working so I turn it up.

“But what’s really ironic is you choosing this place, bringing me here. Because Elena? Never in a million years, in your entire selfish existence will you ever come within a continent of what she is. Her goodness. Her utter goddamn perfection. No wonder Stefan didn’t look back. No wonder you couldn’t tempt him away from her and you sure as hell never tempted me. You pale next to her. There is no one, not even Katherine, as beautiful, as luminous as that girl. She knows how to give and I have never seen you do a single thing but take.” I am gaining on you, bitch.

Her eyes grow dark. “Damon, I’m Elena.”

“Sure you are.” I grab a shoulder with one hand and the towel with the other.

She clutches the towel around her. “What are you --?”

“Come on, Rebekah. All of this, this whole psychotic plot, is it just because you didn’t get enough? That’s why you’re posing as the one person I would do anything,
anything
to be with, you pathetic slit. So I’ll fuck you like I mean it.”

“What?” I’ve hit a nerve. She’s shaken, I can see it. Sucks to lose the reins, doesn’t it?

“You want more? I’m right here.” I give her no room and I am fooling the hook, it is singing, clapping and dancing around in my head at this cringing Elena and there is markedly less pain. I am outsmarting Rebekah and her hook. Sure, that same small part of me that has no imagination is horrified to intimidate Elena like this and what I’m about to do I would slice my arm off before I did it to her but I remind that idiot that this is not Elena, Elena will never know about this, this is between me and Rebekah. This is only us and I am winning. I run my fingernails down her arm and take her hand tenderly and now who reeks of mockery? I kiss each fingertip, one at a time. Then I force her whole hand inside the front of my jeans.

“Damon!”

I cram it lower, I rub, I thrust, but there is no room because once again, thanks to the hook, I am harder than stone.

“Don’t act innocent. We both know where this hand has been.” She yanks and slips her hand out but it was there, skin against skin and part of me gnaws at the idea that it was Elena. No, idiot, it was imaginary Elena and that is nothing new. She cradles her hand, she is frozen. Something new, maybe terror, lurks behind her eyes. Good. I am close.

She trembles. “Listen to me.
I’m Elena
. Rebekah let you go.” She reaches her hand out, do it, just try to touch me the way she touches me. Show your damn self. “Damon, she doesn’t have you anymore. You’re okay, you’re here. With me.” She is desperate, she is grasping at straws. Her fingers move an inch closer to my face.

My hand is up and I hear the slap before I feel it. The hook is exploding with glee and high-fiving my frontal lobe. “I would know you anywhere. You’re hollow. You’re a gaping hole. I
know
you, Rebekah, and I own you.” Her cheek blooms pink. I throw her back against the bed hard and her head slams against the headboard. Crack. Two points for unnecessary roughness.

I hear the front door and that is an interesting twist. Baby Stefan again? My father? Who the hell knows, but she’s screaming for help and I need to get one last point before the game changes so I climb on top, I grab her hair and slam her head on that board again.

“Elena?” Alaric’s voice. Huh, not bad, Rebekah. He’s pounding up the stairs. He’s here, the bedroom door bangs open behind me. “Jesus Christ,” he groans, his voice is a heavy rasp and it is the sound of losing the last of everything you have ever loved. I whip around and there is something about this. The hook howls and the tiny me inside that knew it was really Elena is suddenly enormous. It is monstrous, I am monstrous, I am losing the thread. I am losing.

Alaric grabs my shoulders and I let him, holy hell, I won’t stop him, this is real and everything that just happened
happened
. I am nothing but Rebekah, filled with her. I am the gaping hole. He’s dragging me off the bed, off of Elena whose head I just smashed
twice
. I can smell the blood. My jaw stings. Again. Again. My knees buckle.

“Ric, stop, STOP!” Again. He is holding me up and beating me down. “There’s something wrong with him!”

Chapter 5

Ric won’t let go of my collar and that is fine with me because I have no intention of fighting back.

“He didn’t know who I was. He’s not okay,” Elena says. The outside of her voice is steel but there’s a squishy, terrified center and that’s because of me so the hook is temporarily satisfied.

Alaric stares at Elena, at her blood on the headboard. “Are
you
okay?” he asks her.

“Tie me up,” I murmur.

“I’ve got a vervain syringe in my car. Can you walk, Elena? Can you get it?”

I am screaming and it’s inside my head and outside my head, it erupts from deep in my chest, “NO!” No more vervain for me. No more vervain for me.
Really
.

My cheekbone stings and I heave a low, relieved sigh because I know that Ric will stop me from hurting her even if I can’t stop myself, but no more vervain for me. Jesus God, no vervain.

“Don’t hurt him,” Elena begs. She re-wraps the towel around herself and it is wildly unfair that she hasn’t flashed me yet. “I’m fine. I’ll get the vervain.”

“
I can’t!
No! NO!” I push, I flail. He is digging me into this dingy carpet but no more vervain for me, seriously, no no no no.

“Go!” Alaric yells after her and she is running through the bathroom, grabbing her robe and finally I see a flash of hip, positively ludicrous what your mind seizes on in panic, her skin catches the harsh bathroom light as she drops the towel and flips the robe across her back and she’s gone.

I have very little time left and I honestly do not know what will happen if they stick me. Will I die? Will I be forced to bleed myself dry, hey Rebekah, can I borrow your torture rig? No more fucking vervain for me.

I grab Ric’s wrists. “Ric. Listen to me.”

“Not a chance.”

“Tie me up. Break my neck. But no vervain. I Can’t. Have. Vervain.” I try, I can’t help but show him a glimpse of what it costs me to spit these words at him but he doesn’t see it. He glares at me like I’m a D-minus essay. “Rebekah said I can’t!” Maybe I could tell him more but I know, I haven’t tested it but I am pretty damn certain that if I spell the whole compulsion out for him my brains will light themselves on fire and burn me from the inside out.

“Rebekah told you not to take vervain?”

I push him off. “Get me out of here before Elena comes back. I am begging you.” Yank. Apparently the hook would prefer I stay. Are my eyes bleeding? 

“That’s what the vervain is for!”

“You don’t need it and
I
can’t have it
.”

“Don’t crack my spine on the way out of here.”

I grit my teeth because the hook is grinding my brain into pesto. “Just take me far, far away from your complicated little parenting experiment.” Yank.
GOD
.

Elena is back with the syringe. She’s out of breath and slippery satin is a stupid way to keep a robe closed.

I take his arm and try not to squeeze it off. “Ric?”

There is a moment when he isn’t sure, but then he is. “Okay,” he says, and he’s looking me in the eye in that way that he does, that way that feels like he is in it with me and thank God he isn’t but yeah, thank God he is. “Elena, get Stefan over here. I’m taking Damon to my place.”

She holds the syringe out to him. Her arm is so slim, a bone is nothing. It’s chalk. I could crush it, there isn’t a thing in this room that could stop me but that vervain she’s holding. That vervain I just convinced Ric not to use because I am Rebekah’s boy scout.

He shakes his head. “No vervain. It’s okay.”

She is unbearably vulnerable and I am losing my grip. “Tie me up,” I growl because even after all of the bilge and crud she heard me spew she is fine, she is just fine and I
have to hurt her
. Snap her neck. Crush her skull, smash her pelvis.

Elena is shaking her head. “Don’t Ric, I trust him, he didn’t mean to --”

Twist off her head. Rip out her heart. “Tie me up, Ric. Now.” The hook is directing traffic, all violent ideas to the front, whiny-ass bitches in the back.

Ric strains at the tangle of instructions. He whips back to me. “But you said --”