The Vampire Diaries: Trust In Betrayal (Kindle Worlds) (In Time We Trust Trilogy Book 3) (21 page)

My eyes settle on the second bed in the room, the covers still tight and untouched which tells me I was right about what direction their “friendship” was headed. With a pang, I realize I’m going to be officially related to Jeremy soon. Well, might as well get a head start on our future love/hate relationship.

“We knew you before you showed up at the house with Jeremy on Augustine vampire barbecue night,” I tell Cali.

“Damon…” Stefan starts to protest, his shoulders snapping tight as he realizes what I’m about to do.

“We both danced with you, Stefan drank your blood and I kissed you.”

Jeremy flinches like I slapped him and I hold both palms up, waving casually mocking jazz hands.

“And this time, can we please skip the high school analysis of exactly what
kind
of kiss it was? I’ll save you some time and just say no, Jeremy, I don’t want your girlfriend. She’s plenty hot, I’m just not that into her.”

“What in the—” Cali starts, and I wag a finger at her.

“Ah-ah-ah. No interruptions. Not done yet. You tracked us down, shit got weird, Elena gave you vervain, long story short you cracked her skull open with a cutting board and spent three days in our dungeon before we could compel you to forget everything, though to be fair, Jeremy didn’t know we had a houseguest at the time. The
good
news is that—”

He’s fast, I’ll give him that. I didn’t see Jeremy start to move until his fist was most of the way to my face and yeah, maybe I could have caught it but his girl is watching and so I just let it plow knuckles-first into my jaw.

My head snaps to the side and I have to rock my weight quickly to keep from an ignominious stumble. When he winds up for another one, I hold up a single finger.

“Don’t,” I snap, and he freezes though his eyes are furious. “That was your freebie.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Cali says slowly. “But I’ve never met you before this week.”

“Trust me,” I tell her. “We’re both about to wish that was true.”

“Why? Why did you do it?” Jeremy asks hoarsely, and his eyes are shining with tears I know he won’t want Cali to see. It’s going to take a minute to sink in for Cali, but Jeremy’s already there.

“Because we’re vampires, Jeremy.” I spread my hands. “We eat. It’s what we do.” And to be fair, he knew I was taking Stefan out to feed every night. I just don’t think he ever considered that our prey might end up a little close to home. I keep my eyes away from Cali when I lower my voice and tell him, man to man, “We didn’t hurt her.”

His hand flexes and crap, I really don’t know what I’m going to do if he tries to hit me again. I flick a glance at Cali and she’s just sitting there, one bare foot tucked underneath her and one knee bent up against her chest. Her hand is still clutching her sweater closed but it looks like she’s forgotten how to work her fingers, the fist sitting hollow and still like it’s carved from glass.

I look at my brother and jerk my head toward Cali.

He doesn’t move.

“Damon, of all the stupid things you’ve done,” he says in a low voice, “this is…” he shakes his head.

“Oh, get over yourself, Stefan,” I say impatiently. “We drank some blood, and it was a little extra complicated to compel her to forget. Big deal. You’re not the Unabomber and we didn’t know she was about to be part of our happy freaking road trip across America.” I glance at Jeremy. “Look, I know everybody’s going to get all whiny about it, but I’m the one who’s trying to be honest here. And if you weren’t so freaky about compulsion, I wouldn’t even think it was important enough to bring it back up.”

“Freaky?” Jeremy shouts, arms flexing hard at his sides. “Are you kidding me? You
attacked
her and erased her memory. How is that not
important
?”

I sigh. “This could have gone a completely different way, you know. We could have held hands, thanked each other for our integrity and openness, sang a little Kumbaya and played license plate poker for the rest of the night. Hey, if we got lucky, maybe we could even have had another fun and foggy car chase.”

Jeremy’s glaring at me and I recognize that look. If he were Elena, that’d be about three weeks of the silent treatment, no time off for good behavior or crossbow arrows in the back. Since it’s Jeremy…maybe more like four weeks.

It’s gonna be a looong road trip.

“
Today,
Stefan,” I prompt.

He starts reluctantly toward Cali and the movement jars her out of her shock. She leaps out of the chair and sucks in a breath.

“Don’t scream,” he says quickly, his eyes dilating. For a second, I consider not hating him.

She tries anyway, and seems surprised when no sound comes out. Jeremy’s in front of her in a second, his eyes wild.

“Don’t,” Jeremy warns Stefan, his hand held up between them and his whole body taut and coiled into a partial crouch, even though he’s unarmed. His eyes are darting back and forth between the two of us but he’s smart enough to look scared. Kid knows he wouldn’t stand a chance.

“Look, we’re not going to hurt anyone,” Stefan says, keeping his voice low and calm. “She’s not on vervain, so I can give her back her memories. That’s all.”

Cali darts across the room and snatches a can of bear mace out of her duffel bag, keeping it aimed at me as she edges past on her way to Jeremy’s side. I stuff my hands in my pockets and click my tongue at her disapprovingly.

“I bought that mace. Isn’t it rude to use weapons against the guy who paid for them? I ought to email Emily Post to add it to the next edition,” I snipe.

“I could tell you everything that happened,” Stefan says, his eyes following Cali intently. “But you wouldn’t really know, wouldn’t remember the way it happened unless I lifted the compulsion.”

She scoffs. “Right, because I can so obviously trust you.”

I stroll over and drop into the chair she vacated, kicking my feet up onto the other one and crossing my boots at the ankles. “We can’t compel Jeremy,” I say off-handedly. “He can tell you exactly what we say.”

She hesitates, the mace wavering in her hands. I note she hasn’t pulled the safety tab off the trigger yet, so I lace my hands behind my head and watch the ceiling, whistling casually through my teeth. They all need to calm the hell down. The least I can do is be a good example.

“It’s your choice,” I hear Jeremy say, low and sincere. “If you want your real memories back, I’ll be right here and I swear I won’t let them compel you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

“Can we hurry this up?” I ask. “I could seriously use at least a power nap before we hit the road again.”

There’s a second of silence that I assume is one or all of them giving me a dirty look, and then Cali says, with only the hint of a tremor under the uninflected words, “Fine. Do it.”

I sit back up. “No mace,” I order, and snap my fingers. She glares and chucks the can straight at my head. I catch it without blinking and set it on the table, giving her an artificial smile. “Thank you.”

She wraps her sweater more tightly around her and sits on the very edge of the bed, looking like she might bolt any second. Her eyes leap up to Jeremy and he takes a step closer so his leg almost touches hers, but he doesn’t sit down.

Stefan drops a knee to the floor so he’s on her level, and I start to whistle again, watching idly. Probably for the best that I wasn’t the one who compelled her the first time. Stef does non-threatening a hell of a lot better than I do.

Cali leans back away from him, just a little, and Jeremy rests a hand on her shoulder. “I’m right here.”

She swallows, fast like we won’t see it. “Just get it over with,” she tells Stefan.

He looks her in the eye, and I swear he looks closer to tears than she does. It makes me glad I’m doing this today instead of in a couple years. I knew everybody was going to get all melodramatic and now we’re all stuck out on the road together so they’ll have to pout and bicker and hopefully get over it that much faster.

“You’re going to remember everything I compelled you to forget,” Stefan says. “And you’re not going to tell anyone that vampires are real.”

My eyebrows bob up. About damn time somebody around here grew some pragmatism.

Cali blinks once, and looks around, her hands going to the edge of the bed for balance.

She looks at me and flushes, and then her eyes fall on Stefan and widen with something completely different. “I— You—”

“What’s wrong?” Jeremy demands, going pale. “Is there more?”

She swallows and looks away from Stefan, who rises slowly to his feet and takes a step back.

“Get,” she says, very quietly, “the hell out of my room.”

Jeremy’s hand falls numbly from her shoulder. “Wait, Cali, you have to know I didn’t have anything to do with this. I had no idea they had ever even
met
you.”

She looks at him and the depth of pain in her eyes almost makes
me
flinch. Shit, all we gave her back was the memory of a blood share and a few boring days in a cell. What is her malfunction?

I swing my legs out of the chair and head for the door. “We’re outta here in an hour and a half. Get some sleep and don’t miss the bus, kiddos.”

“Just go,” Cali whispers, and when Stefan and I head out, Jeremy’s right behind us. The door swings shut and we look at each other.

“Anybody up for donuts?” I say, and Stefan just stares at me. It’s not quite a glare, but it’s too still to be anything else.

Jeremy sags against the door and drops his butt to the ground, both hands digging into his hair as his elbows shove hard against his knees, the muscles in his arms standing out in stark relief.

“Maybe we had to tell her,” Stefan says in a low, terse voice. “But you didn’t have to tell her now, brother.” He shakes his head, snorting a soft breath of disgust out through his nose. “I guess I should have known when you got engaged that you would screw it up somehow. Some things never change.”

He turns, and walks away.

“Like how you’re a sanctimonious hypocrite who’d prefer to lie to himself and everyone around him?” I snap. “Yeah, never fucking changes.”

My hand curls closed and I fight the urge to hit the door that my fiancé’s brother is huddled against. Never fails. Once a century when I get the wild urge to play hero and do the right damn thing, everybody hates me for it.

If I was smart I’d march my ass back to my room and slide in next to Elena’s warm, naked body and enjoy the next couple hours before she wakes up and gets pissed off at me, too, for being man enough to bite the bullet even when it was inconvenient.

I hesitate, looking down at Jeremy.

He tips his head back and stares up at me with soft brown eyes gone dark with disgust. “How the hell could you keep a girl locked in our basement for three days and never tell me?
Jesus,
Damon.”

With a deadbolt and bad human hearing, simple as that.

The words are on my lips and my weight’s already rocking into my heels to turn toward the parking lot, my Camaro, and the heck away from all this drama. But just like Cali is not just some girl anymore, Jeremy’s not just some annoying teenager anymore.

I’m stuck with both of them. Probably for good.

I squat down in front of Jeremy and look him square in the eye. “I did tell you. As soon as I realized she was more than a dinner-and-a-movie-and-a-couple-of-bases-in-the-backseat kind of girlfriend. We feed on humans, Jeremy, and we do what we do to keep our secret.”