The Beginning | Damon Salvatore #1

Chapter 18

Alex stood to her feet and surveyed the room. Arthur and the rest of Elias's men were wiping their faces as they watched Elias become feeble before them. The Winchesters, the Salvatores, and Elena all stared at Alex. She'd just reversed the curse of being a vampire.

Dean took the first step toward her. Arthur's features morphed from sadness to apprehension, but Dean held up his hands in surrender. They never pounced. He knelt beside Alex.

"Can you stand?" He asked, looking down into her puffy eyes, one swollen from her cut. He winced as she nodded, holding out her hand for him to pull her from the cold concrete. Damon's chest tightened as he watched, but he fumed.

His eyes darted to the feeble man on the floor and he darted toward him, pulling him up from the ground and looking him in the eye.

"Damon, don't!" Alex and Stefan screamed. He felt the fury in his heart as he glared into the peaceful eyes of the man who killed Alex's family.

"Why do you deserve forgiveness? How can scum like you get a do-over, huh?" He questioned through a clenched jaw. A tear escaped the corner of Elias's eye; he nearly chuckled.

"I don't," he said. Damon had hands on him now; he wasn't sure if it was the other men in the room or his brother. When he glanced around, he noticed the men that were standing around had disappeared and all that was left was the ones he knew and the one he wanted to kill.

"Come on, Damon," Stefan said with a hand on Damon's chest. Alex pulled away from Dean and found Damon's hand. She moved her body between Damon and Elias and used her other hand to make him look at her. He softened as he saw the remaining tears in her eyes and the blood running down her cheek.

"It's okay, Damon," she said softly. Dean turned away and walked over to the door where Sam had remained.

"You're such an idiot for running," Damon said, letting one of his hands find her arm. Stefan stepped away, leading Elena and the Winchesters out of the building. Elias didn't move, but he stayed silent, still trying to collect himself after wilting into humanity.

"I'm sorry. I meant what I said about wanting to stay and I won't run again, but I had to do this," she said, letting fresh tears leave her eyes. One seeped into her laceration, burning the exposed flesh, but she hid her wince. Damon remained quiet; he didn't look at her blood. It didn't bother him, but he didn't want her to think he even thought of it being there in between them, separating them, defining them as separate species.

"I have to tell you something," she said, looking down and back up into his eyes. "I didn't tell you everything that Gabriel told me." His face was still, bringing an anxious gnawing into her stomach.

"He told me to come here, that God wanted me to come here and help him. I didn't really understand why at first, but now that you're here, I know," she said, letting her hand cup Damon's cheek, rubbing the already-dry streaks of tears. "In order to be free in my heart, I had to forgive the one who'd hurt me the most, so I could save the one I cared for the most."

His eyes pierced her. She wasn't sure if he was angry that she'd lied about not telling him the whole truth or not, but his eyes finally softened. She brought her other hand to his opposite cheek and willed him to see that it was him she was talking about. Sure, she cared for Sam, Dean, Elena, and even Stefan, but it was a distinct difference in her heart from Damon: the one who'd interrogated her the most in the beginning, the one who provided for her even when he was unsure if he could trust her, the one who fought for the justice of her family when she talked about not killing Elias. It was different.

Damon peered down at her as his undead heart beat hard in his chest. She cared for him? She, who had nearly snarled at the thought of vampires when she'd been sitting on the couch, who hadn't flinched when faced with the demon in Bonnie, who willingly walked into a most certain death for him? No. She couldn't care about him. It wasn't right. She would be sacrificing her eternity to care for him.

"Damon, I'm talking about you. You know that right?" She pleaded, another tear seeping into the exposed flesh of her cheek. Pain flashed in his eyes and she flinched.

"Alex, to care about me would be the same as letting go of any eternal happiness. I can't give you what you need," he said in a whisper, pulling her hands from her face. She felt the sob rising in her chest, but she was silent. He didn't want her. Damon finally looked at the cut on her face and down to his hand.

"Let me heal your cut." She never moved. Her eyes fell to Damon's chest and she barely registered that he had bitten his wrist and pushed it to her mouth. She didn't fight him. She could barely swallow. He'd not cared about her.

Damon wiped the excess blood from her mouth as her wound closed up, cell by cell, muscles by muscle. She was frozen, eyes fixed on his chest.

"Come on. Let's get out of here," he said, wrestling with the need to kiss her pain away, but he simply placed his hand on her arm and led her out of the building.