Unstoppable | The Vampire Diaries

16. Into The Storm

"I say we go to Pearl's, bust down the door, and annihilate the idiot that attacked us last night," Damon said the next morning, adding tape to the boarded-up broken window.

"Yeah, and then what?" Stefan asked. "We turn to the rest of that house of vampires and say 'Oops. Sorry.'?"

"I can't believe you made a deal with her," Elena shook her head, glaring at Damon with disdain.

Riley couldn't stop remembering the events of yesterday, including Pearl and Anna's visit. "In his defense, she didn't give him much of a choice," she said. "That Pearl lady is... scary."

"I don't care, you should have said no!" Elena snapped, directing her anger at Damon. "I mean, it's bad enough that I woke up this morning to learn that all the vampires have been released from the tomb, but now this? Where does it end, Damon?"

"How long are you gonna blame me for turning your birth mother into a vampire?" Damon asked her with a wry smirk.

"Excuse me?!" Riley asked in disbelief, looking from Elena to Damon and back. "You did what?"

Elena turned to her, her face contorted in anger. "Oh, that's right, I forgot to tell you. He didn't kill Isobel, he turned her. So somewhere I have a vampire birth-mother running around because of him."

"You're forgetting a small detail... she begged me to," Damon said, the smirk still on his face.

Riley rolled her eyes, heading for the door.

"Where are you going?" Stefan asked.

She laughed nervously. "Look guys, I'm not cut out for this. Every day there's another new vampire drama and last night, I got stabbed. I just need... a break."

"And what do we do about the tomb vampires?" Elena asked. The fact that there were a number of vampires living in her town completely terrified her.

Riley whirled around, her hand almost on the doorknob. "You guys let them out, and Bonnie's grams is dead because of it. As long as Caroline, Bonnie, Matt and everyone else is safe... I couldn't care less."

"She doesn't mean that," Damon said. "Trust me, she doesn't want these vampires hanging around town any more than we do."

He was right, the last thing Riley wanted was for the town to be infested with vampires. But she wasn't a vampire, or a vampire hunter, or even the girlfriend of a vampire. So what could she do about it?

"Unless it's a life or death situation... please don't call me," she said, leaving before they could say anything else. She couldn't allow herself to be pulled back into their world – that's how people got themselves killed.

***

"Do you really think you should be driving in this weather?" Riley asked down the phone with a smile as she looked out at the storm. She hadn't heard from either of the Salvatore brothers or Elena all day, and it was weirdly comforting.

"I have to," Caroline responded from her car. "It's my dad's boyfriend's daughter's birthday. We have a non-traditional, traditional ritual."

"I'm just saying, you're not a great driver at the best of times," she joked, making Caroline laugh.

"Hey!"

"I'm kidding! Look, just be careful, OK? With Bonnie gone, I need my best friend in one piece."

"How's she doing?" Caroline asked. "With her Grams' funeral and everything?"

Riley had made sure to keep in touch with Bonnie while she was away. "She's coping, as best she can. It's just hard."