CHAPTER EIGHTEEN | BECAUSE

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NOW THAT STEFAN'S HUMANITY WAS BACK ON, THE NEXT STEP WAS TO GET CAROLINE'S BACK, TOO. Damon, Evelyn, Elena, and Stefan all gathered in the Salvatore house to discuss the ongoing plan and how they were going to trigger an emotion in Caroline. All Evelyn wanted was the perky, neurotic blonde that they all adored, not the humanity-free bitch she currently was.

"The first step, convince her that my humanity is still off. I'll tell her that my run-in with our mother had no effect on me and I want to keep the party going." Stefan simply shrugged whilst his brother handed him a tumbler of bourbon.

"Oh, look at that. Saint Stefan has a plan." Damon mocked with a bemused smirk. "Let me guess. Whoever's holding the kitten gets to talk about their feelings?"

"Shut up, Damon." Evelyn scolded as she rolled her eyes, then turned her attention back to the younger Salvatore. "But, please tell me you've got a better idea than that."

"Torture her until she breaks."

"Sold." Damon cheered with a smirk on his face whilst he moved beside his fiancé, who took a sip of his bourbon.

The Gilbert doppelganger awkwardly cleared her throat and glanced between the vampires. "So, do I need to remind you three that last time Caroline thought we were trying to flip her switch she went on a killing spree?

"Uh. Yeah, Elena's got a point there." Evelyn nodded in agreement. "Caroline isn't stupid. She'll find out what we're doing and then she'll rip our hearts out."

"Well, she's not gonna find out this time." The younger brother shrugged with a nonchalant look on his face.

"Easier said than done, Stefan." Evelyn hummed lowly, almost as if she weren't convinced.

"Fine. Say she believes you. How do you know she's even gonna want to see you again?" Elena began to pace around the parlor while Stefan just looked down awkwardly.

"Oh, she'll want to see him,"

After Damon had consistently been muttering things under his breath, Elena and Evelyn both glanced at each other and realized there was something they didn't know about. "We're missing something. What is it?"

"Hang on a second." Elena too had the same look on her face as the other female in the room. "Did you and Caroline—"

"Do it?" Damon interrupted Elena's question with a smirk. "Yup."

"Oh." The Austin vampire's eyes widened in surprise, then she glanced over to Stefan, who looked absolutely mortified. "My God. Wow, uh— so you guys had hot no-humanity se—"

"It's not exactly how I wanted things to go down, but I can't change it now, so can we just drop it?"

"Okay. Sore subject. Understood." Damon nodded understandingly before he changed the subject. "So, what do we do once you earn her trust?"

"We drain her of her blood, make her weak and then bombard her with everything she used to care about. Memories of who she was. Her friendships. Her mom." The younger Salvatore listed off before he turned to the doppelganger. "Did you bring it?"

"Yeah." Elena simply pulled out a letter from her inside pocket and handed it over to him.

"What is that?" Damon watched the exchange with confusion.

"Caroline got rid of everything from her former life. Her mom had sent this letter, intending for it to arrive after she died, which it did, but Caroline had already flipped her switch." Elena explained for the other two vampires.

"And, you think it'll trigger some emotion?" Evelyn scanned the letter with a pondering look, then shrugged. "That's actually a good call."

"Sure. Unless she wants sexy Stefan time instead of an assault on memory lane." Damon mocked once more but Evelyn smacked the back of his head. "What! I'm just being truthful, Eve."

"I'm not gonna let that happen." Stefan shook his head with a determined glare.

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It had been three days and Stefan and Caroline were safely drying out in a vampire-proofed room in a B&B. The group had been taking it in turns babysitting to make sure that Caroline made no attempt to escape, and when Evelyn and Damon entered to take over from Elena, they saw the doppelganger looked distraught.

"Elena? What's happened?" Evelyn furrowed her brows as Elena brought her hand up to her forehead with a distressed sigh.

"She burned the letter." Elena blurted out as soon as she heard sighs from the couple. "Caroline burned the letter right in front of my eyes. Along with any hope of triggering her emotions."

"Oh." Damon's mouth turned into a perfect 'O' shape as Elena pulled her phone from her pocket. "Any more bad news you wanna tell us?"

"What? No. Sorry. Just Jer checking in. Do you guys mind—"

"Go call Jeremy, Damon and I can take it from here." Evelyn gave Elena a comforting smile before the doppelganger hurried out of the B&B with her phone up to her ear. Once Elena was out of earshot, Evelyn turned to Damon. "You know, we've got nothing now, don't you? That letter was our one shot, Damon. And, now it's gone."

Damon walked toward the brunette, his arms snaked around her waist as he pulled her closer. "Okay, look. Yeah, blondie burning the letter was a big screw-up. But, we've got this, okay? We'll get Caroline back, I promise you."

Evelyn took a deep breath to relax herself with her head rested against Damon's shoulder. "Well, at least Jo and Alaric can completely dismiss this place from their list of honeymoon options. It's awful."

"They have a list?" The Salvatore tilted his head in her direction with a curious look on his face.

"Well, I don't know." She answered back with a small nod when she pulled herself away from Damon. "But, Jo's pregnant. Pregnant women aren't usually advised to fly."

"And what about you?" Damon hummed while he raised an eyebrow. "Do you have a list?"

"A list of where I'd go on my fictional honeymoon before I give birth to my fictional baby?" The Austin vampire asked with a smirk before her expression faded. "I mean, no. I don't really spend a lot of time thinking about it, to be honest. But, I can tell you one thing. It would not be here."

"Well, excuse me." He scoffed playfully before he bit his lip. "I guess we've never played the let's-pretend-we're-a-human-couple fantasy game together." As he looked up, he saw her curious eyes fixed on him. "Alright, you're human. Five years from now, where are you?"

"Aw. You're so insecure, it's adorable." Evelyn rolled her eyes and let out a sigh almost like she was exhausted. "I'd be with you, obviously."

Damon rolled his blue eyes and let a noise escape his lips. "Boring. I'll need a zip code."

"Fine." Evelyn adjusted herself as the pair sat down in the wicker chairs at the end of the hall. "In an apartment in Paris, overlooking the entire city. Obviously, underneath that apartment is a nightclub, that we own. You know, cause you can never have enough booze."

"A nightclub?" He repeated with a roll of his eyes. "I should've known."

"Shut up." Evelyn lightly slapped the back of his head before she continued. "And, when we're not running our amazingly popular nightclub in Paris, we're traveling." She simply shrugged with a sure smile.

"Kids?"

"Of course, when we've finished with the traveling, though. That wouldn't be fair on them. But, I think we should have two just in case our attention is taken by—" She pressed her lips firmly against the Salvatore's, "—other things."

"Ugh, this is torture!" Caroline's voice echoed through the halls as a loud noise came from above them. It sounded almost as if Caroline was making yet another attempt to escape.

"Sounds like the rats are restless." Damon let a sigh escape his lips as he and Evelyn wandered upstairs with case files. "Bored yet?" He asked with an arched brow as he peered into the vampire-proofed prison.

"Go away, Damon." The Forbes vampire groaned out weakly.

"Brought you some light reading from the True Crime section." He pushed the case files in through the bars on the door. "Curious; which one of you idiots attacked a stadium security guard and shoved him in a laundry cart?"

"That would be me," Caroline answered dully.

"Points for effort." Evelyn hummed playfully with a smirk. "Though, I could've done better."

"Why are you only picking on me?" The blonde humanity-less vampire turned and pointed to Stefan who sat behind her. "Stefan's in here, too. Annoy him."

"Because Stefan didn't snap a bar back's clavicle in half. You know, it's really quite sad actually. I can see Liz right now, calling the parents, breaking the news, wondering where she went wrong as a mother."

Caroline rolled her eyes. A bored look on her face. "She got cancer, Damon. That is where she went wrong."

"Sure, Caroline. Because getting cancer was Liz's fault." Evelyn sarcastically commented back.

"You know what? You're right. I should really be more like you and Damon. Just play make-believe about the life I can't have. Because that's healthy." Caroline snickered while Evelyn turned on her heels and gripped the bars tightly. "Maybe I'll pretend that I'll get married or that I can actually give birth to babies, and have a normal life. And, I can get a job without having to move and start over every five years."

Damon turned to see the look of disgust and heartbreak on Evelyn's face. "You're a real bitch when you're hungry." He growled at Caroline before he turned back around to face Evelyn.

"I'm curious, Damon. How does it feel knowing you can't give someone the life she really wants?

"I swear Caroline if you don't shut up I will come in there and make you." Evelyn spat viciously.

"I'm just stating facts, Evelyn. You can act like this is what you really want, but we all know the truth. You want a life that you can never have. And, it's just so sad." Evelyn threw her hands up in surrender and ran out of the hallway.

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"Hey," Damon called out to the brunette vampire who was perched on a wall just a short walk away from the B&B. "You okay? You ran outta' there so fast."

"Yeah. I'm fine. I just— I don't know, today's just hit very close to home." Evelyn spoke out from the silence while the couple just sat wearing unreadable expressions. "Caroline wrong, though. This is what I want. To be with you, and—"

"Do you want to be a human?" Damon turned his head to her with a raised eyebrow.

"What?" She furrowed her brows in confusion. "Of course not. No, I haven't wanted to be human in a very long time. Damon, I was given a second chance to be with you because I was turned."

"Okay." Damon trailed off with a raised eyebrow and a dumbfounded look on his face. "So, what's got you so upset?"

"Because that game we played earlier; I want that. Minus the human part. I just— We're never gonna be able to live our lives in Mystic Falls. Not when there's a doppelganger invasion. Or an Original Hybrid coming to town, or anything in between." Evelyn took a deep breath as Damon interlocked their fingers. "I mean, have you and I genuinely experienced life without the supernatural drama?"

"That's an easy fix." A smile swept across Damon's face like a wildfire as Evelyn's brows furrowed.

"What're you— What're you talking about?"

"Evelyn, the second that Ric's wedding is over, we are out of here, do you understand me?" The couple's eyes immediately locked. "We're going to Paris and we're going to get married. And from there? Who knows. But, all I know is that you're right. You and I are so damn lucky we're able to be together right now, so why are we wasting our lives here dwelling in drama when we can be selfish. Hell, we've never been selfish before. Maybe we should start."

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