The Vampire Diaries: Out of my Mind (Kindle Worlds Novella) Read Online Free Page B

Stefan again? My father? Who the hell knows, but she’s screaming for help and I need to get one last point before the game changes so I climb on top, I grab her hair and slam her head on that board again.
    “Elena?” Alaric’s voice. Huh, not bad, Rebekah. He’s pounding up the stairs. He’s here, the bedroom door bangs open behind me. “Jesus Christ,” he groans, his voice is a heavy rasp and it is the sound of losing the last of everything you have ever loved. I whip around and there is something about this. The hook howls and the tiny me inside that knew it was really Elena is suddenly enormous. It is monstrous, I am monstrous, I am losing the thread. I am losing.
    Alaric grabs my shoulders and I let him, holy hell, I won’t stop him, this is real and everything that just happened happened . I am nothing but Rebekah, filled with her. I am the gaping hole. He’s dragging me off the bed, off of Elena whose head I just smashed twice . I can smell the blood. My jaw stings. Again. Again. My knees buckle.
    “Ric, stop, STOP!” Again. He is holding me up and beating me down. “There’s something wrong with him!”

Chapter 5
     
    Ric won’t let go of my collar and that is fine with me because I have no intention of fighting back.
    “He didn’t know who I was. He’s not okay,” Elena says. The outside of her voice is steel but there’s a squishy, terrified center and that’s because of me so the hook is temporarily satisfied.
    Alaric stares at Elena, at her blood on the headboard. “Are you okay?” he asks her.
    “Tie me up,” I murmur.
    “I’ve got a vervain syringe in my car. Can you walk, Elena? Can you get it?”
    I am screaming and it’s inside my head and outside my head, it erupts from deep in my chest, “NO!” No more vervain for me. No more vervain for me. Really .
    My cheekbone stings and I heave a low, relieved sigh because I know that Ric will stop me from hurting her even if I can’t stop myself, but no more vervain for me. Jesus God, no vervain.
    “Don’t hurt him,” Elena begs. She re-wraps the towel around herself and it is wildly unfair that she hasn’t flashed me yet. “I’m fine. I’ll get the vervain.”
    “ I can’t! No! NO!” I push, I flail. He is digging me into this dingy carpet but no more vervain for me, seriously, no no no no.
    “Go!” Alaric yells after her and she is running through the bathroom, grabbing her robe and finally I see a flash of hip, positively ludicrous what your mind seizes on in panic, her skin catches the harsh bathroom light as she drops the towel and flips the robe across her back and she’s gone.
    I have very little time left and I honestly do not know what will happen if they stick me. Will I die? Will I be forced to bleed myself dry, hey Rebekah, can I borrow your torture rig? No more fucking vervain for me.
    I grab Ric’s wrists. “Ric. Listen to me.”
    “Not a chance.”
    “Tie me up. Break my neck. But no vervain. I Can’t. Have. Vervain.” I try, I can’t help but show him a glimpse of what it costs me to spit these words at him but he doesn’t see it. He glares at me like I’m a D-minus essay. “Rebekah said I can’t!” Maybe I could tell him more but I know, I haven’t tested it but I am pretty damn certain that if I spell the whole compulsion out for him my brains will light themselves on fire and burn me from the inside out.
    “Rebekah told you not to take vervain?”
    I push him off. “Get me out of here before Elena comes back. I am begging you.” Yank. Apparently the hook would prefer I stay. Are my eyes bleeding? 
    “That’s what the vervain is for!”
    “You don’t need it and I can’t have it .”
    “Don’t crack my spine on the way out of here.”
    I grit my teeth because the hook is grinding my brain into pesto. “Just take me far, far away from your complicated little parenting experiment.” Yank. GOD .
    Elena is back with the syringe. She’s out of breath and slippery satin is a stupid way