Part 12 (2/2)

It was ”Goodnight Sweetheart.” ”You monster,” Bonnie gasped. Pain shot through her stomach. Her hand gripped the window frame,tighter, tighter. ”You monster, Ihate you! I hate you!”

Meredith heard and straightened up, turning. She shakily pushed back her hair and managed a few deep

breaths, trying to look as if she could cope. ”You're cutting your hand,” she said. ”Here, let me see it.”

Bonnie hadn't even realized she was gripping broken gla.s.s. She let Meredith take the hand, but instead of letting her examine it, she turned it over and clasped Meredith's own cold hand tightly. Meredith looked terrible: dark eyes glazed, lips blue-white and shaking. But Meredith was still trying to take care of her, still trying to keep it together.

”Go on,” she said, looking at her friend intently. ”Cry, Meredith. Scream if you want to. But get it out

somehow. You don't have to be cool now and keep it all inside. You have every right to lose it today.”

For a moment Meredith just stood there, trembling, but then she shook her head with a ghastly attempt at a smile. ”I can't. I'm just not made that way. Come on, let me look at the hand.”

Bonnie might have argued, but just then Matt came around the corner. He started violently to see the girls standing there.

”What are you doing-?” he began. Then he saw the window.

”She's dead,” Meredith said flatly.

”I know.” Matt looked like a bad photograph of himself, an overexposed one. ”They told me up front.

They're bringing out...” He stopped.

”We blew it. Even after we promised her...” Meredith stopped too. There was nothing more to say. ”But the police will have to believe us now,” Bonnie said, looking at Matt, then Meredith, finding one thing to be grateful for. ”They'llhave to.” ”No,” Matt said, ” theywon't, Bonnie. Because they're saying it's a suicide.” ”Asuicide ?. Have they seen that room? They callthat a suicide?” Bonnie cried, her voice rising. ”They're saying she was mentally unbalanced. They're saying she-got hold of some scissors...”

”Oh, my G.o.d,” Meredith said, turning away.

”They think maybe she was feeling guilty for having killed Sue.”

”Somebody broke into this house,” Bonnie said fiercely. ”They've got to admit that!”

”No.” Meredith's voice was soft, as if she were very tired. ”Look at the window here. The gla.s.s is all

outside. Somebody from the inside broke it.” And that's the rest of what's wrong with the picture, Bonnie thought.

”He probably did, getting out,” Matt said. They looked at each other silently, in defeat.

”Where's Stefan?” Meredith asked Matt quietly. ”Is he out front where everyone can see him?”

”No, once we found out she was dead he headed back this way. I was coming to look for him. He must be around somewhere...”

” s.h.!.+” said Bonnie. The shouting from the front had stopped. So had the woman's screaming. In the relative stillness they could hear a faint voice from beyond the black walnut trees in the back of the yard.

”-whileyou were supposed to be watching her!” The tone made Bonnie's skin break out in gooseflesh. ”That's him!” Matt said. ”And he's with Damon.Come on!”

Once they were among the trees Bonnie could hear Stefan's voice clearly. The two brothers were facing

each other in the moonlight.

”I trusted you, Damon. I trusted you!” Stefan was saying. Bonnie had never seen him so angry, not even withTyler in the graveyard. But it was more than anger.

”And you just let it happen,” Stefan went on, without glancing at Bonnie and the others as they appeared,without giving Damon a chance to reply. ”Why didn't you dosomething ? If you were too much of acoward to fight him, you could at least have called for me. But you just stood there!”

Damon's face was hard, closed. His black eyes glittered, and there was nothing lazy or casual about his posture now. He looked as unbending and brittle as a pane of gla.s.s. He opened his mouth, but Stefan interrupted.

”It's my own fault. I should have known better. Idid know better.They all knew, they warned me, but Iwouldn't listen.” ”Oh, didthey?” Damon snapped a glance toward Bonnie on the sidelines. A chill went through her.

”Stefan, wait,” Matt said. ”I think-”

”I should have listened!” Stefan was raging on. He didn't even seem to hear Matt. ”I should have stayed with her myself. I promised her she would be safe-and I lied! She died thinking I betrayed her.” Bonnie could see it in his face now, the guilt eating into him like acid. ”If I had stayed here-”

”You would be dead too!” Damon hissed. ”This isn't an ordinary vampire you're dealing with. He would have broken you in two like a dry twig-”

”And that would have been better!” Stefan cried. His chest was heaving. ”I would rather have died with her than stood by and watched it! What happened, Damon?” He had gotten hold of himself now, and he was calm, too calm; his green eyes were burning feverishly in his pale face, his voice vicious, poisonous, as he spoke. ”Were you too busy chasing some other girl through the bushes? Or just too uninterested to interfere?”

Damon said nothing. He was just as pale as his brother, every muscle tense and rigid. Waves of black fury were rising from him as he watched Stefan.

”Or maybe you enjoyed it,” Stefan was continuing, moving another half step forward so that he was right in Damon's face. ”Yes, that was probably it; you liked it, being with another killer. Was it good, Damon? Did he let you watch?”

Damon's fist jerked back and he hit Stefan.

It happened too fast for Bonnie's eye to follow. Stefan fell backward onto the soft ground, long legs sprawling. Meredith cried out something, and Matt jumped in front of Damon.

Brave, Bonnie thought dazedly, but stupid. The air was crackling with electricity. Stefan raised a hand to his mouth and found blood, black in the moonlight. Bonnie lurched over to his side and grabbed his arm.

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