They weren’t afraid of him, and, deep inside, this shook Damon. He’d fought monsters stronger than he was, demons and ancient vampires. But they’d always been cautious, a little wary, respecting him even if they didn’t think he was a true threat.
But he didn’t know how to kill these vampires, didn’t even know how to hurt them properly, not for long. And they knew it.
There were too many of them, and he was alone. So Damon did the only thing he could. Between one blink and another, he pulled his Power fiercely around him, feeling his body violently compact. It was almost too much to manage with only animal blood in his veins, but he was determined. There was no way he was going to be ripped apart in the woods with the taste of raccoon still in his mouth.
Just before Jack’s vampires burst through the trees at him, Damon leaped into the air, completing the transition as he jumped. In crow form, he flapped his way above the forest.
They had gotten too close to him that time, he realized, tilting his wings to catch the night breeze. And they would never stop coming after him, now that they’d found him again.
He needed to figure out how to kill them for good.
“I wish Damon was here for this,” Elena said, staring at her own reflection in the dark window.
There are a lot of people I wish were here for this, Bonnie thought. Alaric had invited everyone to his apartment, saying he had new information to share. But “everyone” felt like a lot fewer people now than it ever had.
Bonnie pulled two more chairs into place around the table. Doing this made it so clear to her how many people they were missing. They only needed six chairs, maybe five: Bonnie, Elena, Alaric, Matt, and Jasmine. And Damon, if he showed up. Stefan was gone. Meredith was away, and Bonnie hadn’t heard from her for quite a while.
Zander and his Pack should have been here, but he was still acting distant, and Bonnie hadn’t seen the rest of the Pack for days. She’d texted Zander to come to Elena’s, but she hadn’t been surprised when he’d given an evasive reply. She didn’t know when he’d be home, where he was.
Six chairs. And it looked like the sixth one would be empty.
“Can’t you just do your whole soul-bond thing and call Damon here?” Bonnie asked.
Elena finally turned around and looked at her, shrugging. “He tunes me out most of the time unless it feels like something’s wrong.”
“Really?” Bonnie asked, distracted from her angst. She’d always figured that the bond between Elena and Damon made them perfectly attuned to each other at all times, an open connection of love and longing. Which was totally romantic. And just slightly creepy.
“I tune him out, too,” Elena said. “We’d drive each other crazy otherwise.” She looked a little wistful as she said it.
Alaric came in from the kitchen and handed them each a cup of coffee. “You won’t believe how much I’ve found,” he said.
Before Bonnie or Elena could say anything, they heard feet clomping up the stairs outside, and Alaric hurried over to open the door. Matt and Jasmine came in, hand in hand. Bonnie’s heart gave a twinge of longing. Where was Zander?
“Sorry we’re a little late,” Matt said, “but we have some interesting news for you.”
Jasmine tipped her head up as Alaric kissed her on the cheek in greeting. “Have you heard anything from Meredith lately?”
“I just talked to her. She’s with the hunters, tracking Jack. No leads yet. She’ll let us know right away if they find him.” Alaric smiled, still looking excited about his news, but he seemed tired, too. Bonnie wondered if he was having trouble sleeping without Meredith. Zander had been coming to bed later and later, and she found herself tossing and turning until he came. She wasn’t used to sleeping alone.
“Where’s Zander?” Jasmine asked, as Alaric herded them all toward the table.
“He couldn’t come,” Bonnie said, keeping her voice light. Jasmine just nodded, but there must have been something in Bonnie’s tone, because Matt glanced up at her sharply.
“So I’ve been doing some digging into Jack’s background,” Alaric said, handing around photocopies of a newspaper article. The article was in English, but from a Swiss paper, dated five years before. The headline read WOMAN’S DEATH RULED ANIMAL ATTACK.
“You think this is Jack killing someone?” Matt asked thoughtfully. “Look at how they describe it. Her throat was torn open, she was almost completely drained of blood. Definitely a vampire.”
Alaric shook his head. “Based on the journal Damon found, Jack’s only been a vampire for three years,” he told them. “But look—at the end.” He tapped the last line of the article with one finger. Lucia di Russo is survived by two sisters and her fiancé, Henrik Goetsch.