Closed World || Kai Parker || Kol Mikaelson

06. Encounter

|| SOPHIA

I could hardly look at him without seeing the image of him standing over Maylin, her blood dripping from his mouth. How she lay lifeless on the floor and he stood there completely unimpressed, even daring to grin at us, while my world collapsed.

I couldn't do what Klaus asked me to do. I couldn't work with his brother, my sister's murderer. Even if she was somehow alive again now, she had died - at Kol's hands! If it hadn't been for him, everything would be as normal and peaceful as before. I loathed him for it from the bottom of my heart.

I felt the urgent need to curl up on the floor, crying and writhing until this whole nightmare was over. But the bitter reality was that there were only two possible outcomes.

Either I managed to free Maylin from this prison world and somehow not go crazy while working with Kol. Or Jack died. Okay, so there was only one possible outcome for me, and for that I had to push my feelings aside and accept that this damn psychopath would be watching my every move.

I squinted, took a deep breath and collected myself. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

Finally, I lifted my head and turned my gaze to Kol, who was standing patiently (which was very unlike him) in front of the door, scrutinizing me.

"Okay, if this is going to work, I need some rules," I clarified. Kol raised an eyebrow and was about to say something back, but I raised my hand and intervened. "It's important for both of us. You want to save your sister and I want to save my sister and my boyfriend." Kol rolled his eyes. "I'm doing this more because I don't want Nik deciding over me again. I don't want to end up stabbed in a coffin again." His gaze was cold and a shiver ran down my spine. "Your family is really messed up," I muttered, and now a smile crossed his face. "See, at least there's one thing we agree on."

I forced myself not to say anything bitchy back. I closed my eyes briefly and calmed my breathing again. I felt a breeze, just very soft and light. As if there was a draught somewhere. But when I opened my eyes again, I knew better: Kol was standing right in front of me. I flinched and backed away. Then I raised my hand. "Okay, rule number one: don't do that again!" The grin on his face didn't even waver. "What do you mean?" he asked innocently, moving closer to me again. With every step I took back, he took one forward. It infuriated me how confident he appeared and how he ridiculed my boundaries. "Stop it, Kol," I hissed, feeling my back bump against one of the large bookshelves that lined the wall. Undeterred, he pushed me further and finally pinned me down, resting his hands on the shelf to the right and left of my head. "Listen, Darling, we're playing by my rules here, understand?" he spat out, and even though that smile was still on his lips, I saw anger in his eyes. They were burning brightly.

But there was something else. Something dark that made goose bumps spread all over my body.

His gaze wandered agonizingly slowly over my face and finally lingered on my scarf. An eyebrow shot up and before I could press the fabric to my chest to keep it there, Kol had grabbed the hem with supernatural speed, revealing my neck. Even though my spell had done something and the bite marks were no longer very visible - they were still visible. Especially to trained eyes of a vampire.

Kol's gaze burned into my skin and when he looked me in the eye again, there was something in his gaze that I hadn't seen before. Was that... lust?

An icy shiver ran down my spine. "Look at that," Kol's voice was deeper than before, threatening and gentle at the same time. "You let your boyfriend feed from you?" He tilted his head and I glared at him angrily. I wanted to say something, but no matter what I said, he would see right through me. My heart was beating so fast and I could see that he noticed. He looked at me knowingly and that cursed smirk remained in place. "You're into it." As if in confirmation, my heart pounded even faster.