~*~Bridle My Rage~*~

Disclaimer: I own nothing aside from the rather feeble plot I concocted and my unhealthy obsession with all things TVD.

Author's Note: So Caroline just about made herself my favourite female character this season, and her new vampy attitude is making me think that maybe, just maybe, she could give Damon a run for his money this time around. I've been dying for a deeper confrontation between the two of them since "Brave New World" (although I did love her getting back at him with the whole "you suck" thing tehehe), and so I put pen to paper and came up with this. I'm going to assume that Elena explained everything to Caroline during their confessional scene on the couch during "Kill or Be Killed" and that Caroline is now in the know about Katherine, her history with the Salvatore brothers, and all the juicy goodness that said history entails. Enjoy!

"I'll never know
your sugarcoat
you're ready to blow
you're ready to go
but I'll never know
your sugarcoat
is just as sweet as I am…"
Sugarcoat- Breaking Benjamin

She wakes to the sound of clinking glasses and the sight of his back to her, eased shoulders and busy hands. There are muffled voices upstairs that she's certain belong to Elena and Stefan. She doesn't try to listen any harder because, at this point, the least and the most she could do for them was afford them their privacy.

She can't help the huff of frustration that leaves her lips because, really, this is an inconvenience she could have done without at the moment. And he knows that.

"Sorry to wake you, princess," he drawls, his back still turned to her.

Suddenly, she's in a place that's both so foreign and so familiar it throws her off, knocks the proverbial air out of her lungs. She's a vampire whose mother as good as disowned her for the next three days, whose boyfriend broke up with her as a result of her own machinations, who couldn't go home because she is more afraid than she has ever been.

And yet, despite all the novelties, this scenario in which she played the ditzy, inept, blond afterthought was nothing new… not where she and Damon were concerned. He was always looking at some point past her, some direction adverse to her. She understands now what it was that he was so diligently seeking, knows that it was all for Katherine. But somehow, her newly acquired knowledge does nothing to mitigate the sting of rejection and humiliation. She's tired of all of it, of the second best title that seems to have sown itself onto her chest like an unwelcome reward, of trying so hard for what others acquire so easily, of Damon friggin' Salvatore and his turned back

"What are you even doing here," she bites out vehemently, her agitation getting the best of her the way it always seems to lately.

"I live here."

Leave it to Damon to make her feel like an insipid nine-year old, to leave her silently praying that no one overheard her pride shattered in a way that would make a glass surface cringe. She turns away from him, focusing instead on the flickering flames as they lick each other up only to emerge at a later point in time, sometimes more brilliant and other times more muted than they had been before.

"I wouldn't take what your mother said to heart if I were you," He breaks the silence along with the train of her rather innocuous thoughts with his statement, and she's seething before she knows what hit her.

His back is still turned to her, his tone as blasé as it would have been if he were merely commenting on the weather. She hates him, hates his swagger, his smirk, his cruelty; hates what he can reduce her to with a flick of his tongue or a scathing remark from his lips. She hates how easily he can have her writhing either physically or mentally for a myriad of reasons no one person should possess the power to invoke.

"Screw you," she bites out, her words saturated with the mixture of her hatred and her chagrin.

He finally turns to face her, tumbler of what is indubitably an alcoholic beverage in hand, brows raised in what she doubts is surprise. He saw this coming the same way he seemed to everything else.

"Pardon?"

"Screw you," she repeats, enunciating each syllable, holding his gaze in a way that would have made her squirm not too long ago… she's still squirming a bit, but not nearly as much as she would have and that is what gives her the strength to throw aside the covers and edge her way towards him.

"Screw you and screw what you have to say. Whatever my mom or Elena may think of you, I know better, because I've seen first-hand the selfish, abusive, monster you really are. So don't worry about playing 'mister nice guy' with me… not that you're any good at it anyway."

She says it all in a flurry, words making their way past her lips of their own accord, a string of repressed anger, pain, and humiliation asserting its presence.

He says nothing for a while, instead downing the contents of his tumbler and laying it back onto the table a bit loudly.

"If you're expecting an apology, fine, I'll give you one if you can bring yourself to admit that you were just as selfish as I was," his lips curve into that bitter half-smile that she has come to learn has nothing to do with mirth.

She thinks she finally understands the phrase "laugh in despair" because that is exactly what she's doing at the moment. It's ridiculous, the way he deflects his wrongdoings onto her, infuriating the way he looks at the whole episode with an air of nonchalance, as if it was all nothing, as if it meant nothing because she was nothing.

"Please enlighten me Damon," her sarcasm is so sharp it surprises her he hasn't cut himself on its edges. "Please tell me how whatever it is I did to you can be equated with being used as a blood bag and an errand girl against my free will."

She doesn't bring up the sex, doesn't want to give him the opportunity to throttle what's left of her pride with unsaid words and a smirk that oozes burning subtext.

"Well, there's being used as a trophy boyfriend who puts you a step above all your perky pals, namely Elena," he crosses his arms over his chest, every trace of his faux smile erased.

"You pushed me around, bit me, hurt me!" She's yelling now, well aware of the fact that Stefan and Elena upstairs and her mother in the cellar could potentially hear here. She doesn't care because if there's anything she has that others don't, it's determination and she was going to get her apology even if she had to claw it from the depths of his un-beating heart.

"And if memory serves," he pretends to shuffle through his thoughts, eyes rolled and a finger tapping his chin. "You loved it. You loved the biting, you loved the sex, and you loved flaunting the older, sexier Salvatore brother every chance you got. Long before the compulsion princess, you looked for me."

He's smirking again, taking pride in the salt he just spewed all over her open wound.

"I gave you what you wanted and took a little of what I wanted in return, simple as that."

Something inside her comes undone, the last straw keeping her from falling off her very foundation, from giving in to whatever this new entity within her wants her to be. Before she knows it, she's lunging for him and she has him pinned against the wall, hands clutching his shoulders in a way that is both dominating and desperate. She knows he lets her do this, knows that he is still stronger than her, but that doesn't deter the modicum of satisfaction that surfaces amidst the turmoil… the turmoil that has her eyes blurring behind a layer of tears.

"It's not the same," her voice is higher and more pleading than she would have liked it to be and that probably had a lot to do with the fact that she now has tears streaming down her face, leaving trails that bear witness to their existence in their wake. She's crying for her life that was taken from her on Katherine's whim, for perfect Matt who she could no longer call her boyfriend, for her mother in the cellar who couldn't stand the sight of her, for all of them and the danger they were in… for the fact that she went from making to plans to being a clueless pawn in them.

"Just say you're sorry," she whispers, sounding desperate and feeble even to her own ears.

Something shifts in the way he's looking at her. His gaze is somehow softer, it flickers over the surface of her face in a way that it never has before because he is looking at her and he is seeing only her. They're closer than they should be and she's unsure of whether or not that was the impact's doing or her own.

"I'm sorry," he says so softly she nearly misses it.

And with that, she quite literally crashes into his lips, a frenzy of released rage, reluctant acceptance, and lust getting the best of her and, by the way he's responding, him as well. Her hands travel over his chest, flat palms hungry for more of him, for something to be enough for the first time in a long time. He has a hand buried in her hair, drawing her so close it almost hurts, while his other hand does the same to her lower back. They're flush against one another, not a hairsbreadth of space between them, not a nerve on her body left unruffled by his contact.

She bunches the fabric of his shirt in one of her hands and runs the other over the expanse of his chiselled abdomen, moaning in pleasure at the hard ridges of its surface.

In a flash, she's the one up against the wall letting out a breathy gasp as he leaves her lips in favour of her neck and literally tears her top open, buttons going dangerously awry. She's thankful she opted for the lacy black bra this morning as opposed to a more dull pastel design, not that he even spares it a glance. He's far too intent on flicking his tongue over the region between her neck and her collarbone in ways that making her moan and sigh despite herself, that are making her head spin in a way it hasn't in a very long time because, say what you will about Damon Salvatore, but the man knows what he's doing.

He's kneading her breasts with one hand while the other travels over her exposed skin of back, hovering dangerously close to the clasp of her bra, and she's still bunching his shirt in one hand and running the other over whatever slivers of skin she could get a hold of. When he bites down onto her neck, hard enough to draw blood, she lets out a mixture between a gasp and a whimper, the fabric of his shirt evading her now limp hands. Her body arches closer to his on its own accord, the familiarity of this predicament getting the better of her. It feels even better than she remembers, the mixture between the pain elicited by his teeth and the please elicited by his hands alongside the knowledge that something fundamental was being shared between them…

In the midst of the haziness she hears her name and vaguely wonders if it's coming from his lips.

"Caroline!"

Her eyes open when she no longer feels his teeth piercing her skin or his hands roaming her body. He's looking at her, an indecipherable expression on his face, as aloof and foreign to her as he had been minutes prior before he turns to the stairwell and she feels something akin to disappointment. But she has no time to dwell because Elena, with Stefan in tow, are at the foot of the stairs and her cheeks burn in shame as she rushes to cover her exposed breasts.

Without so much as a word to any of them, Damon turns his back and walks out the door, letting it slam in his wake. Elena edges towards her while Stefan, whether to follow his brother or to keep from infringing on their privacy, leaves as well.

"Caroline, what happened?" Elena asks, her brows knitted together in confusion and concern, causing Caroline's conscience to twinge in her friend's favour for the umpteenth time that night.

"I don't know," she answers truthfully, her voice curiously hollow, removed from her in a way that makes her wonder if it is indeed her own.

Elena gathers Caroline in her arms, attempting to tape the broken pieces of her back together for the second time that night, whispering that it was okay. She doesn't have it in her to retort that things have never been less okay for any of them.

Author's Note: I really hope you guys enjoyed it! To be honest this one kind of got away from me and wrote itself. When I sat down for it, I had a demand for an apology and an interruption form Elena in mind, but there you have it tehehe. I'm seriously considering writing a sequel to this (I have a hot forest scene swimming around in my head). If you guys would be interested in reading it and/or have any ideas, please let me know!