The Struggle (Page 36)

There was no danger that she would fall asleep. As the minutes crawled by, she almost began to wish she could. Time moved with agonizing slowness. Eleven o’clock… eleven thirty… midnight. Onea.m. One thirty. Two.

At 2:10 she heard a sound.

She listened, still lying on her bed, to the faint whisper of noise downstairs. She’d known he would find a way to get in if he wanted. If Damon was that determined, no lock would keep him out.

The hallway was dark, but her eyes had had a long time to adjust. She could see the darker silhouette making its way up the stairs. When it reached the top she saw the swift, deadly glimmer of his smile.

She waited, unsmiling, until he reached her and stood facing her, with only a yard of hardwood floor between them. The house was completely silent. Across the hall Margaret slept; at the end of the passage, Aunt Judith lay wrapped in dreams, unaware of what was going on outside her door.

Damon said nothing, but he looked at her, his eyes taking in the long white nightgown with its high, lacy neck. Elena had chosen it because it was the most modest one she owned, but Damon obviously thought it attractive. She forced herself to stand quietly, but her mouth was dry and her heart was thudding dully. Now was the time. In another minute she would know.

She backed up, without a word or gesture of invitation, leaving the doorway empty. She saw the quick flare in his bottomless eyes, and watched him come eagerly toward her. And watched him stop.

He stood just outside her room, plainly disconcerted. He tried again to step forward but could not. Something seemed to be preventing him from moving any farther. On his face, surprise gave way to puzzlement and then anger.

He looked up, his eyes raking over the lintel, scanning the ceiling on either side of the threshold. Then, as the full realization hit him, his lips pulled back from his teeth in an animal snarl.

Safe on her side of the doorway, Elena laughed softly. It had worked.

"My room and the living room below are all that’s left of the old house," she said to him. "And, of course, that was a different dwelling place. One you werenot invited into, and never will be."

His chest was heaving with anger, his nostrils dilated, his eyes wild. Waves of black rage emanated from him. He looked as if he would like to tear the walls down with his hands, which were twitching and clenching with fury.

Triumph and relief made Elena giddy. "You’d better go now," she said. "There’s nothing for you here."

One minute more those menacing eyes blazed into hers, and then Damon turned around. But he didn’t head for the stairway. Instead, he took one step across the hall and laid his hand on the door to Margaret’s room.

Elena started forward before she knew what she was doing. She stopped in the doorway, grasping the casing trim, her own breath coming hard.

His head whipped around and he smiled at her, a slow, cruel smile. He twisted the doorknob slightly without looking at it. His eyes, like pools of liquid ebony, remained on Elena.

"Your choice," he said.

Elena stood very still, feeling as if all of winter was inside her. Margaret was just a baby. He couldn’t mean it; no one could be such a monster as to hurt a four-year-old.

Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion. She saw Damon’s hand on the doorknob; she saw those merciless eyes. She was walking through the doorway, leaving behind the only safe place she knew.

Death was in the house, Bonnie had said. And now Elena had gone to meet Death of her own free will. She bowed her head to conceal the helpless tears that came to her eyes. It was over. Damon had won.

She did not look up to see him advance on her. But she felt the air stir around her, making her shiver. And then she was enfolded in soft, endless blackness, which wrapped around her like a great bird’s wings.

Chapter Thirteen

Elena stirred, then opened heavy eyelids. Light was showing around the edges of the curtains. She found it hard to move, so she lay there on her bed and tried to piece together what had happened last night.

Damon. Damon had come here and threatened Margaret. And so Elena had gone to him. He’d won.

But why hadn’t he finished it? Elena lifted a languid hand to touch the side of her neck, already knowing what she would find. Yes, there they were: two small punctures that were tender and sensitive to pressure.

Yet she was still alive. He’d stopped short of carrying out his promise. Why?

Her memories of the last hours were confused and blurry. Only fragments were clear. Damon’s eyes looking down at her, filling her whole world. The sharp sting at her throat. And, later, Damon opening his shirt, Damon’s blood welling from a small cut in his neck.

He’d made her drink his blood then. Ifmade was the right word. She didn’t remember putting up any resistance or feeling any revulsion. By then, she had wanted it.

But she wasn’t dead, or even seriously weakened. He hadn’t made her into a vampire. And that was what she couldn’t understand.

He has no morals and no conscience, she reminded herself. So it certainly wasn’t mercy that stopped him. He probably just wants to draw the game out, make you suffer more before he kills you. Or maybe he wants you to be like Vickie, with one foot in the shadow world and one in the light. Going slowly mad that way.

One thing was sure: she wouldn’t be fooled into thinking it was kindness on his part. Damon wasn’t capable of kindness. Or of caring for anybody but himself.

Pushing the blankets back, she rose from the bed. She could hear Aunt Judith moving around in the hallway. It was Monday morning and she had to get ready to go to school.

Dear Diary,

It’s no good pretending I’m not frightened, because I am. Tomorrow’s Thanksgiving, and Founders’ Day is two days after that. And I still haven’t figured out a way to stop Caroline and Tyler.