Chaos (Satisfy Series Book Five, The Vampire Diaries)

Ch. 19: Man on Fire

Damon and I were in the Sheriff's station.

I left a voice mail for Caroline. "Other Blondie, now is not the time to be screening my calls. You're the only one unaccounted for, and I don't know where Elena and Stefan are. At least call your mother."

Liz walked up to us as I hung up. "Why the sudden interest in Mystic Falls history?" 

"You konw when your brother kills your only friend's girl and you're stuck in the middle?" Damon asked.

"No," Liz answered.

"Then don't ask," I told her. 

"Okay," Liz told us. "1960. There was a mugging reported November 9."

"No, no, no," I told her. "It has to be the eighth. He was very specific about the eighth."

"Okay," Liz said. "Well, that would be Maggie James. Died November 8, 1960, unresolved homicide, possible serial killer."

Damon looked at the crime scene photo. "Ooh. Stefan was right. He didn't kill Enzo's girl." 

"How do you know?" I asked.

Damon looked at me. "Because I did." 

Oh, you've gotta be kidding me.

*****

Liz had located them at a restraunt at Whitmore.

Damon and I walked in to see several students compelled to be quiet sitting around, surrounding Elena and Stefan, who were both tied to chairs with vervain ropes, and Enzo was torturing Stefan.

"Well, this is depressing," I told them. "Stadium seating really necessary? These people are starting to creep me out."

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say that was a veiled attempt to get me to release the damn hostages," Enzo told me.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I told him sarcastically. "Was that veiled? Release the damn hostages."

Damon nodded to me. "What she said."

"Whose side are you on?" Enzo asked.

"There are sides now?" Damon asked.

"You were there with me in Augustine," Enzo told him. "Look. Don't tell me you've forgotten what it was like to cling onto the one thing that kept you from feeling pain."

"Enzo, I get it,' Damon told him. "The prospect of seeing Maggie again was your safety line to the outside world, the one thing that kept you from shutting it off. There's probably a chapter in Elena's psych book about it. What, are you two study buddies now?" 

I looked at Damon, mouthing my words. 'What are you doing?'

Damon shrugged slightly, turning his attention back to Enzo. "The thing is I didn't know she was your Maggie."

"What are you talking about?" Enzo asked. 

"She didn't tell me her name when we met," Damon told him. 

"And when exactly was that?" Enzo asked.

"November 8, 1960," Damon answered. "I'd gotten a message at the house saying a lady wanted to buy me a drink. Naturally, I was curious." Maggie had tried to kill him after she tried to vervain him. Damon caught her wrist, then gripped her throat until her head came off, and repositioned it next to her body, using Stefan's M.O. "Had she gotten me with that vervain injection, things would have been very different. She didn't stand a chance against me."