Elena hadn’t been the only one to see the slow rising of Damon’s bent head, and the glimmer in his eyes as they traveled the length of the room to the star ball filled with Power. Elena could practically hear his logic. Matt might be totally off track… but there was one place a human could be sure to find powerful vampires. In the Dark Dimension — to which there was a Gateway in the boardinghouse’s garden.
The Gateway was closed right now…for lack of Power.
Unlike Stefan, Damon would have absolutely no qualms about what would happen if he had to use all the star ball’s liquid, which would result in the death of Misao.
After all, she was one of the two foxes who had abandoned Stefan to be tortured.
So all bets were off.
Okay, you’re scared; now deal with it, Elena told herself fiercely. Damon’s been in that room for almost fifty hours now — and who knows what he’s been plotting to do to get hold of the star ball. Still, somebody’s got to get him to eat — and when you say “somebody,” face it, it’s you.
Elena had been standing at the door so long that her knees were starting to lock.
She took a deep breath and knocked.
There was no answer, and no light went on inside. Damon was human. It was quite dark outside now.
“Damon?” It was meant to be a call. It came out a whisper.
No answer. No light.
Elena swallowed. He had to be in there.
Elena knocked harder. Nothing. Finally, she tried the knob. To her horror it was unlocked, and it swung open to reveal an interior as dark as the night around Elena, like the maw of a pit.
The fine hairs at the back of Elena’s neck were standing up.
“Damon, I’m coming in,” she managed in a bare whisper, as if to convince herself by her quietness that there was nobody there. “I’ll be silhouetted against the very edge of the porch light. I can’t see anything, so you have all the advantages.
I’m carrying a tray with very hot coffee, cookies, and steak tartar, no seasonings.
You should be able to smell the coffee.”
It was odd, though. Elena’s senses told her that there was no one standing directly in front of her, waiting for her to literally run into him. All right, she thought.
Start with baby steps. Step one. Step two. Step three — I must be well into the room now, but it’s still too dim to see anything. Step four…
A strong arm came out of the darkness and locked in an iron grip around her waist, and a knife pressed against her throat.
Elena saw blackness shot with a sudden gray network, after which the dark closed in overwhelmingly.
Elena couldn’t have been out for more than a few seconds. When she came to, everything was the same — although she wondered how she hadn’t lethally cut her own throat on the knife.
She knew that the tray with the dishes and cup had gone flying into the darkness in that first instant when she couldn’t help flinging out her arms. But now she recognized the grip, she recognized the scent, and she understood the reason for the knife. And she was glad that she did, because she was about as proud of fainting as Sage would have been of doing it. She wasn’t a fainter!
Now she willed herself to sag in Damon’s arms, except for where the knife was.
To show him that she was no threat.
“Hello, princess,” a voice like black velvet said into her ear. Elena felt an inner shiver — but not of fear. No, it was more as if her insides were melting. But he didn’t change his grasp on her.
“Damon…” she said huskily, “I’m here to help you. Please let me. For your sake.”
As abruptly as it had come, the iron grip was withdrawn from her waist. The knife stopped pressing into her flesh, although the sharp, stinging feeling at her throat was quite enough to remind her that Damon would have it ready. Substitute fangs.
There was a click, and suddenly the room was too bright.
Slowly, Elena turned to look at Damon. And even now, even when he was pale and rumpled and haggard from not eating, he was so gorgeous that her heart seemed to plummet into darkness. His black hair, falling every which way over his forehead; his perfect, carven features; his arrogant, sensual mouth — right now compressed into a brooding line…
“Where is it, Elena?” he asked briefly. Not what. Where. He knew she wasn’t stupid, and, of course, he knew the humans in the boardinghouse were hiding the star ball from him deliberately.
“Is that all you have to say to me?” Elena whispered.
She saw the helpless softening in his eyes, and he took one step toward her as if he couldn’t help himself, but the next instant he looked grim. “Tell me, and then maybe I’ll have more.”
“I…see. Well, then, we made a system, two days ago,” Elena said quietly.
“Everyone draws lots for it. Then the person who gets the paper with the X takes it from the center of the kitchen table and everyone goes to their rooms and stays there until the person with the star ball hides it. I didn’t get the lot today, so I don’t know where it is. But you can try to — test me.” Elena could feel her body cringing as she said the last words, feeling soft and helpless and easily hurt.
Damon reached over and slowly slipped a hand beneath her hair. He could slam her head against a wall, or throw her across the room. He could simply squeeze her neck between knife and hand until her head fell off. Elena knew that he was in the mood to take out his emotions on a human, but she did nothing. Said nothing.
Just stood and looked into her eyes.
Slowly, Damon bent toward her and brushed his lips — so softly — against hers.
Elena’s eyes drifted shut. But the next moment Damon winced and slid the hand back out of her hair.
That was when Elena gave another thought as to what must have become of the food she had been bringing to him. Near-scalding coffee seemed to have splashed her hand and arm and soaked her jeans on one thigh. The cup and saucer were laying in pieces on the floor. The tray and the cookies had bounced off behind a chair. The plate of steak tartar, however, had miraculously landed on the couch, right side up. There was miscellaneous cutlery everywhere.
Elena felt her head and shoulders droop in fear and pain. That was her immediate universe right now — fear and pain. Overwhelming her. She wasn’t usually a crier, but she couldn’t help the tears that filled her eyes.
Damn! Damon thought.
It was her. Elena. He’d been so certain an adversary was spying on him, that one of his many enemies had tracked him down and was setting a trap…someone who had discovered that he was as weak as a child now.
It hadn’t even occurred to him that it might be her, until he was holding her soft body with one arm, and smelling the perfume of her hair as he held an ice-slick blade to her throat with the other.
And then he’d snapped on a light and saw what he had already guessed.
Unbelievable! He hadn’t recognized her. He had been outside in the garden when he’d seen the door to the storage room standing open and had known that there was an intruder. But with his senses degraded as they were he hadn’t been able to tell who was inside.
No excuses could cover up the facts. He had hurt and terrified Elena. He had hurt her. And instead of apologizing he had tried to force the truth out of her for his own selfish desires.
And now, her throat…
His eyes were drawn to the thin line of red droplets on Elena’s throat where the knife had cut her when she’d jerked in fear before collapsing right onto it. Had she fainted? She could have died right then, in his arms, if he hadn’t been fast enough in whipping the knife away.