If only | Damon Salvatore

013. BEING THE KEY, OR THE LOOPHOLE

Chapter thirteen

"Being the key, or the loophole."

Blinking heavily, Beatrix slowly drifted back into consciousness. All she could see was pitch black. She tried to lift her arms, but the heavy, metallic rattle of iron chains echoed loudly in her ears. Panic setting in, she tried to kick her legs out, only to be met with the exact same suffocating restraint. Her chest tightened, the air growing thick as she realized she was entirely trapped.

Suddenly, the harsh scrape of a heavy door opening cut through the dark.

A body was violently shoved into the room. Beatrix tilted her head upward blindly as Elena scrambled up from the floor. Elena's eyes went completely wide with horror.

Lying cramped against the wall was Beatrix. She was heavily blindfolded, thick duct tape was sealed over her mouth, and her hands and feet were secured with chains anchored tightly to the metal pipes beneath a utility sink. Matched against the red of her vintage curls was a dark, crusty streak of dried blood.

"Beatrix?!" Elena gasped, dropping to her knees beside her.

Through the tape, Beatrix let out a desperate, muffled grunt. She frantically kicked her chained foot out, gesturing toward the dark corner of the room. Her mind raced back to the night before—recalling the hazy moment she had briefly woken up to the sound of Ben the bartender's voice. He had laughed, making a cruel joke about having 'two witches for the price of one.' Beatrix didn't need her eyesight to know exactly who was lying in the shadows beside her.

Elena furrowed her brows, her hands shaking. "What? Beatrix, what are you trying to say?"

"Mmm-ph... Bonnie!" Beatrix forcefully grunted against the tape, the name coming out completely garbled.

Frustrated, Beatrix violently thrashed her bound hands, making the iron chains rattle and clank aggressively against the pipes. Elena whipped her head around in terror, tracking the movement toward the far corner of the dark room. Her breath hitched.

"Bonnie?!" Elena choked out, spotting her other best friend unconscious in the bathtub.

Beatrix huffed rapidly through her nose, but the overwhelming claustrophobia of the blindfold and the tape completely closed in on her. Her lungs refused to take in air, and she began to violently hyperventilate, her bound chest heaving as Elena turned back to her in pure, unadulterated panic.

Having spent the entire night tracking dead ends, Winnifred and Cassandra grew tired of the useless search. They marched up the steps of the Salvatore boarding house, determined to get answers.

"So, should we just knock, or—" Cassandra started.

Before she could finish the sentence, Winnifred threw her hand out, unleashing a sharp wave of telekinetic magic. The heavy front doors burst open, slamming violently against the inside wall.

The two witches stepped across the threshold just as Stefan used his vampire speed to blur into the entryway, his stance guarded. "What are you doing here?" he demanded.

"I have looked everywhere that I can possibly think of for my granddaughter," Winnifred shared, her voice ringing with ice. "I am here because this house is my last and only option for finding her alive."

Stefan's eyes went wide as the pieces clicked together. "Annabelle took her, too."

"She went out to pick up dinner last night and never came back," Cassandra explained, a tremor of panic cutting through her calm exterior. "A witch like Beatrix doesn't just run off. People like us get taken. We get used for our abilities. And if Annabelle took my daughter..."