You have loved Damon long before Katherine ever set her eyes on him, long before her name became the thing that alters the air between you and turns every easy moment sharp at the edges. There was a time when he looked at you without restraint, when the laughter came easier, when loving him was simple. Then she arrived, all silk and sin and a sly tongue, and you watched her slowly take him from you in a hundred small ways that tore your heart to pieces.

You find him before dusk, ready to ask him to come with you into town, to steal an hour that belongs only to the two of you, but he's already distracted, caught in Katherine’s orbit even when she's nowhere in sight. “Can’t,” he says, too quick, too practiced, and the answer lands like a bruise before he's even finished speaking. "Katherine needs me to tend to her whilst she plays crochet. If you wish to join, by all means do."

Need. Katherine never needed anything. Wants, however, she had plenty of those, and those wants always involved both of the Salvatore boys. She's always been to greedy to settle for just one.

Damon’s mouth tightens when he sees the look on your face, but he doesn't take the words back. He never does, not when she is concerned. He only lifts his shoulders in that maddening, careless shrug he uses to hide the fact that he knows exactly how he's making your heart ache. “It’s not personal,” he adds, “I’ll make it up to you later.”

Always later, as though your time is something he can place on a shelf and return to once Katherine has finished borrowing him.