I brought her into this, Matt thought, and cupped her cheek gently, feeling sick with guilt. “I shouldn’t have let her go in there,” he said, his voice choked.
Jasmine wiped away the tears, her hands shaking. “I’m okay,” she said, her voice rough, and tried to sit up.
“Stop!” Matt said, pulling her closer, trying to hold her tight. “You’re bleeding.”
“There are bandages in my bag,” Jasmine said, laying her head back in his lap. Her voice shook, and Matt could see her gritting her teeth, forcing herself to be calm. “Put pressure on it.”
Elena was already in motion, deftly pressing a cotton pad against Jasmine’s neck and wrapping gauze around it. “The bleeding’s almost stopped,” she said. “It’s not as bad as it looked.”
Now that he knew Jasmine would be okay, Matt felt like he was going to throw up. Everyone he had ever fallen in love with had died, even Elena, and he had just gone ahead and let Jasmine into his mess of a life.
“We’re going,” he said to her soothingly. “I’ll get you home.” He tried to pick her up again, but Jasmine twisted out of his arms.
“Wait,” she said, determined. “I want… I could use the blood of a natural vampire, for comparison.”
“Jasmine, you don’t have to…” Matt began, his heart aching.
She gave Damon a shaky smile. “Put out your arm for me? Please?”
Damon extended one arm, and Jasmine used a fresh hypodermic to draw a vial of blood. She worked efficiently, but, as she capped the vial, her hands shook and she dropped it, spilling more blood across the concrete floor. “Sorry, sorry,” she said, her hands fumbling in her bag, a flush stealing across her pale cheeks.
“My fault,” Damon murmured, holding out his arm and smiling reassuringly. “I’m so clumsy sometimes.”
Matt blinked. Damon Salvatore, gentle and kind with Matt’s girlfriend? Bothering to put someone other than Elena at ease?
Matt ran a hand down Jasmine’s back, reassuring himself that she was solid and real and not hurt. He was heavily aware of the unconscious vampire, his face turned toward them, soon to awake again.
“You’re not safe,” he murmured, almost to himself, and felt Damon’s eyes on him. “None of us are safe, not while Jack and his vampires are after us.”
Part of Matt wanted to rush Jasmine away. If none of them were safe here, wasn’t the solution to get away? Jack didn’t want Jasmine, didn’t want Matt. He was after Damon.
But Matt knew that Elena, whose dark blue eyes were fixed intently on Damon’s face, would never agree to leave him. And he could tell just by looking at Jasmine, capable and strong once more, that she wouldn’t either.
“Not until we figure out a way to kill them,” Damon agreed. He nodded to Jasmine. “That’s where you come in.”
Something in Matt hardened. The only thing that mattered was protecting Jasmine.
“You have to keep experimenting on him,” he told Damon, looking at the young face of the vampire in the cage, slack in unconsciousness. “If we want this to end, we’ll have to finish them.”
“More coffee, hon?” The waitress refilled Bonnie and Elena’s cups before moving on to the next table. The little diner halfway between their apartments was busy, bright, and cheerful, as it always was on a Sunday morning. They hadn’t been here in a while, but Bonnie thought bright and cheerful was exactly what Elena needed right now.
“Sounds like Jasmine’s tougher than I thought,” Bonnie said, swiping cream cheese across her bagel. Elena had been filling her in on the latest in the quest to discover the truth about the synthetic vampires. “Has Meredith found out anything from the hunters down in Atlanta?”
Elena sighed, resting her chin on her fist as she stared into her coffee. “She hasn’t returned any of my calls. I got a text saying she was okay, but that’s it.”
“Yeah, same. She’s probably busy,” Bonnie offered. Meredith was pretty good at looking after herself. Right now, Bonnie was more concerned about Elena.
Elena had been distant lately, caught up with Damon and with her new Guardian task. Bonnie was glad that she had something to focus on. Elena was still pale and solemn, but she didn’t seem as stunned with grief as she’d been right after Stefan’s death.
Bonnie ripped open a sugar packet and poured it into her coffee. Mostly to get the sad, distracted expression off Elena’s face, she asked, “How’s the search for Siobhan? Any luck?”
Elena scowled. “I haven’t had any leads on her since I lost her aura at that drive-in. I keep dreaming about her, but I can’t find her.”