Leo's foot pressed against the brake pedal. The car slowed, just enough, just barely enough. His mind calculated distances and speeds with the cold precision of a machine. Three seconds. Maybe four. Enough time for Elena to get out.
His voice came out sharp, urgent, cutting through the roar of engines and the rush of wind.
"ELENA! Go!"
Elena looked at the open door. The ground rushed past below, dark asphalt streaked with white lines. She could jump. She should jump. Her body tensed, preparing to throw itself into the night. But then her head turned. Her eyes found his face in the dim light of the dashboard.
"What will you do, Leo?" Her voice was thin, breaking.She did not want to leave him. She did not want to survive if it meant he would not.
Leo looked at her. The other car was almost upon them now. Its headlights filled the interior of his BMW with white glare, casting harsh shadows across Elena's face. There was no time for long explanations. No time for the careful unveiling of truths he had wanted to give her. There was only time for the simplest, most essential words.
"Elena," he said. His voice was gentle now, soft despite the chaos surrounding them. "Nothing can happen to me. Nothing." He paused. "Remember how Stefan feared me? Remember how he spoke to me like a servant to a master? That is because I am stronger than him. Stronger than all of them." He stopped. There was more he wanted to say, more he needed to explain, but the other car filled his vision completely now. No time.
He spoke again, his voice dropping to something even softer, even gentler. A smile touched his lips, small and sad and full of love.
"I love you, Elena."
And then he pushed her.
His hand pressed against her shoulder, firm and unrelenting. She was frozen, her mind blank with terror, her body refusing to obey the commands her brain sent. If he did not push, she would not jump. She would sit there, paralyzed, and die with him in the crash. So he pushed.
She fell. Her body tumbled through the open door, twisting in the air. Her hands reached out instinctively, grasping for something to hold, finding nothing. For one terrible moment she was suspended in darkness, the ground far below, the car rushing away from her. Then she hit.
The asphalt scraped her palms and knees. Skin tore. Blood welled up in thin lines. She tumbled once, twice, three times, the momentum of the car carrying her forward even after she had left it. Rocks and gravel bit into her flesh. Her shoulder slammed against the hard ground. Pain exploded through her body, sharp and immediate.
But she was alive and out of the car.
She lifted her head. Her eyes found the car, Leo's car, speeding away from her now. She saw him behind the wheel, his face turned toward her for just a moment. She saw his lips move, forming words she could not hear. And then she screamed.
"LEOOOO!"
Her voice tore through the night, raw and desperate and full of everything she could not say. Her hand reached out toward the disappearing car, as if she could pull it back through sheer will. Tears streamed down her face.
Leo heard her scream. It cut through him like a blade, sharp and painful. But he did not look back. He could not look back. His hand released the brake. His foot slammed against the accelerator. The car surged forward, engine roaring, straight toward the oncoming vehicle.
In the other car, Lexi and Stefan moved. Their vampire reflexes kicked in, faster than human eyes could follow. They threw themselves sideways, bursting through the doors an instant before impact. Their bodies tumbled across the asphalt, rolling with the practiced grace of creatures who had survived centuries of violence.
Leo's hand reached for his own door handle. He had pushed Elena out. He had saved her. Now he needed to save himself. His fingers closed around the latch. He pulled.
The door opened. Cold air rushed in. He began to throw himself sideways, following the same path Elena had taken moments before.
But he was too slow.
The other car hit.
The impact was enormous, a crash of metal against metal that echoed across the dark road like thunder. The two vehicles crumpled into each other, hoods folding like paper, engines shattering, glass exploding outward in a million glittering fragments. The force of the collision lifted Leo's car from the ground and spun it sideways. It rolled once, twice, three times, metal screaming against asphalt.
And then the fire came.
Gasoline ignited. Flames erupted from the wreckage, orange and red and impossibly bright. They climbed toward the sky, consuming everything they touched. A mushroom cloud of smoke and fire rose into the darkness, visible for miles around, a funeral pyre lit against the night.
On the side of the road, Elena watched. Her body was frozen, her face wet with tears, her hands bleeding onto the asphalt. She watched the fire consume the car. She watched it consume him. And she screamed again, a sound that came from somewhere so deep inside her that she did not know it existed until this moment.
"No. No. No. NO!"
She tried to stand. Her legs would not hold her. She tried to crawl toward the fire. Her arms would not move. She could only lie there, half on the road, half on the shoulder, and watch the flames dance against the sky and know that the boy she loved was inside them.
Across the road, Lexi and Stefan stood together. Their injuries had already healed, skin smoothing over,bruises healing. Lexi watched the burning wreckage with a cold smile on her face. The fire reflected in her hazel eyes, giving them an orange glow.
She said softly. "This is what you get when you provoke me. Even if you are a devil. Even if you are something from hell. Fire still burns. Fire still kills." She laughed again, a quiet, satisfied sound. "No one does what you did to me and walks away."
Stefan stood beside her. His eyes were not on the fire. They were on Elena. He watched her lying on the road, crying, bleeding, broken. His chest tightened. His heart that hadn't beaten for more than a century, ached at the sight of her.
But then a small smile appeared on his face. It was not a happy smile. It was the smile of a man who sees a problem and knows he can solve it. He could compel her. He could walk over to her, look into her tear-filled eyes, and make her forget. Forget Leo. Forget the crash. Forget everything that had happened tonight. He could give her peace, even if it was a false peace. He could give her a life where this night did not exist.
He turned his gaze back to the burning car. The flames were still high, still hungry, still consuming.
"This is the best punishment," he murmured. "For what you did to me. For what you did to Lexi. For everything."
He nodded to himself. But somewhere deep inside, in a place he did not like to examine too closely, a small voice whispered that this was not justice. This was not punishment. This was murder, dressed up in righteous clothes and given a pretty name.
He ignored the voice. He had learned, over a hundred and forty-five years, that some voices were better left unheard
The fire still burned. It roared and crackled and sent black smoke twisting into the night sky. The heat was immense, enough to melt glass and warp metal, enough to turn flesh to ash and bone to dust. Any normal person caught in that inferno would have been gone in seconds, their body consumed, their existence reduced to memory and grief.
But Leo was not a normal person.
Beneath the pile of burning metal, beneath the twisted chassis and melted upholstery, his body lay untouched. The flames licked at his skin, hungry and insistent, but they found nothing to consume. His flesh did not blister. His hair did not burn. The fire washed over him like water over stone, present but powerless. The upper part of his clothes had melted away entirely, destroyed by the heat, leaving his chest and arms bare. His lower clothes remained, though patches had burned through, creating holes that exposed the skin below his knees.
He had been unconscious for a moment. The impact, the violence of the collision, had stunned even him. But now his mind surfaced again, pushing through the fog of temporary disorientation. He became aware of the fire first—its heat, its sound, its endless hungry movement. Then he became aware of his body, whole and unharmed, resting among the wreckage.
A grunt escaped his lips. It was not a sound of pain. It was effort, pure physical effort, as he planted his palms against the twisted metal beneath him and pushed. His arms straightened. His back rose. The fire parted around him like a curtain, unable to touch him, unable to slow him. He used his full strength in one concentrated burst and stood up directly, rising through the sea of flames like a swimmer breaking the surface.
To him, this was nothing. The fire was warm, yes, but no warmer than the hot baths he had taken in the luxury houses of his past. It was comfortable, almost soothing. A reminder of power, of invulnerability, of the vast distance between himself and the mortal creatures who thought they could destroy him.
....
Beside the old tree at the edge of the road, Lexi leaned against the rough bark. Her body was relaxed now, the tension of the attack fading into satisfied exhaustion. She turned to Stefan, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth.
"Now Leo, that devil, is dead," she said. Her voice was light, almost cheerful. "You can go after Elena now. Make her forget. Make her yours." She paused, her smile widening. "She will never know what happened. She will never know he existed. You can have everything you wanted."
She stopped.
Her eyes, which had been fixed on Stefan's face, drifted past him toward the burning wreckage. Toward the pillar of fire and smoke that marked the grave of Leo Whittemore. Toward the figure that was rising from the flames.
Her mouth fell open.
It was not because of his bare chest, though it was enough to charm anyone—muscular, defined, gleaming with sweat and firelight. It was not because of his appearance at all. It was because he was alive. He was walking. He was stepping out of the inferno with slow, deliberate steps, his burning pants still clinging to his legs, his upper body bare and unmarked. He was alive, and he was walking toward them, and on his face was a cold smile. The same cold smile Lexi had worn when she aimed her car at his. The same cold smile of a hunter who has cornered his prey and is moving in for the kill.
Stefan saw her expression change. He turned. His green eyes opened wide, impossibly wide, as he took in the sight of Leo walking out of the fire. His brain refused to process it at first. Fire killed vampires. Fire killed everything. Nothing walked out of a fire like that, untouched, unharmed, smiling. Nothing.
Lexi moved first. Centuries of survival instinct took over, bypassing shock and fear and confusion. Her hand reached behind her back and pulled out the wooden stake she had prepared earlier. Its tip was sharp, reinforced with metal, designed to pierce even the toughest vampire heart. She held it ready, her body shifting into a combat stance.
"Stefan!" Her voice was sharp, commanding. "It's not time to shock! We have to kill him! Now! Otherwise he will kill us!"
Stefan heard her. His own hand moved, reaching behind his back, pulling out his own stake. His fingers wrapped around the wood, feeling its familiar weight. Two stakes. Two vampires. One target. The odds were still in their favor. They had to be.
Leo watched them. His superhuman senses caught every word, every movement, every flicker of fear in their eyes. He shook his head slowly, a small, almost pitying gesture. They were still fools. If fire could not burn him, if an exploding car could not scratch him, what did they think those little toys would do? What did they think wooden stakes, meant for killing vampires, would accomplish against someone who was not a vampire at all?
He moved.
One step. That was all it took. One step, and the distance between them vanished. He crossed the space in a single instant, appearing before them faster than their vampire eyes could track. They had no time to react, no time to run, no time to do anything but attack.
And attack they did.
Lexi lunged forward, her stake aimed directly at the center of his chest. She put her full strength behind it, all the power of three and a half centuries of existence channeled into that single point. Beside her, Stefan moved in perfect sync, his stake aimed at Leo's stomach. Two attacks, two targets, one coordinated strike designed to pierce his heart and disembowel him simultaneously.
They reached him.
The stakes struck.
Neither penetrated.
Lexi's stake hit his chest and stopped dead, its point pressing against skin that did not yield, did not give, did not even bruise. She pushed harder, throwing more strength into it, and still nothing. The wood bent slightly under the pressure. The metal tip scraped uselessly against flesh that might as well have been diamond.
Stefan's stake struck his stomach with the same result. He pushed, grunted, pushed again. The stake did not enter. It did not even leave a mark. Leo's skin was impervious, absolute, a wall against which their weapons were nothing more than children's toys.
A flicker of confusion crossed both their faces. Then fear. Deep, primal fear that reached into the oldest parts of their vampire souls and whispered that they had made a terrible mistake.
Lexi's voice came out small, trembling, stripped of all its earlier confidence. "What... what is your body made of?"
Leo looked at her. His smile remained, cold and patient and utterly without mercy. His hands moved, faster than they could dodge, and closed around both their throats. His grip was iron, absolute, cutting off air and movement and hope.
He leaned in close. His voice was soft, almost gentle, the voice of a teacher explaining a simple lesson to slow students.
"Go ask your grandmother."
....
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