Forever

Dream of me

Two years later

"Holy shit!" Waking up to an empty hotel room wasn't new. Josh was an early riser and I was not.

Except, it wasn't empty.

Elijah and Kol stood in the center of the room, looking around in distaste. "Really sister? Must you subject yourself to such.. deplorable sleeping arrangements, just to avoid your family?"

"H-how did you find me?"

"I didn't. A witch merely projected us into your mind."

Kol started walking around. "I know your sleeping habits the best out of any of us. It wasn't hard to wager a guess on when you would be asleep."

"Okay, first off, that's creepy. Second, I thought I told you all I was done. I don't want to be your sister and I don't want to be your soulmate, get that through your heads." Despite our conversation in the mansion and the revelation, I still managed to sneak away.

Something I was kind of proud of.

They had to let their guard down eventually.

Where was Josh? He'd be dead the second he walked in on this.

Elijah moved to sit at the questionably built table, eyes lingering a little too long on the leather jacket draped over the chair on the other side of the table. "You are a member of this family whether you agree with it or not. That mark on your wrist tied you to Kol from the moment the both of you were born. Now, it's time to end this and return to the only family you have left."

"No."

"Elijah, perhaps she needs more time."

"I still won't agree. You both know why I left and why I refuse to be part of your family." Okay so this was a dream. Elijah had definitely seen the jacket and there was no way Kol hadn't spotted literally any of Josh's things littered around the room.

Kol walked over to Elijah and handed him something. "Drew." The eldest of the pair warned.

I held my tongue. What were they doing?

Elijah vanished and Kol dragged a chair to the foot of the bed. "Hello, my love."

"You don't get to call me that." Out of all the originals, Kol was the last one I expected to betray me. "You lost me the second you held me back."

He straddled the chair and ran a hand down his face. "I never meant to hurt you. Niklaus was seconds away from inflicting his rage on you, I couldn't let that happen."

"So you let my siblings die instead?"

Kol hung his head. "I let you go, didn't I? And you betrayed me, with a hunter no less." 

Dread curled in my gut. "I don't-"

"Don't lie. I've known where you were." He crossed his arms atop the back of the chair, absently rubbing his own mark, pausing for a moment. "Come back to me Drew, I don't care how long it takes."

The way he was acting bothered me, I hadn't noticed it before but it was like he was holding back. "Why are you so different? Your brothers, they would always tell me how horrible you were and yet..."

Kol didn't seem to want to stop moving. He ran a hand through his hair, when he met my eyes though, they were darker, so much darker. "Do you know how easy it would be to force the bond? I'll admit, I wanted to when I first saw that mark on your wrist, it's what my brute of a father would've done- what he did do to my mother. How she feared him. Out of everyone in my life, I didn't want you to be afraid of me." He looked away. "And now I find you sharing a bed with another."

I didn't know what to say. "You told me a long time ago that you had lovers before me, that Klaus would've killed them if you didn't. You're a hypocrite." Kol and I weren't together. Not anymore.

We barely were before.

"And I don't understand how you do not feel the way I do. I feel like I can't think without you by my side."

"I stopped feeling anything but hate when you held me back. I want to stay as far from you and your psychotic siblings as I can." My mark was burning, urging me to go to him.

It'd been that way this entire time.

His jaw clenched and I could see the hurt on his damn face. "It doesn't matter. Elijah will find you soon."

My stomach dropped. "What?"

"You missed quite a lot since your disappearance. I let you go in a time of weakness. It won't happen again."

They were going to kill Josh.

Like they killed Elena and Jeremy.

Like Jenna.

"Make no mistake. I won't force the bond. But I will keep you close. You're still vulnerable to my enemies, and I won't let you get yourself killed because you were angry at me." Kol rose and I found myself shrinking back. "I'd rather have you pissed off and alive than happy and dead."

For the first time since I met him, I was truly afraid.

I needed to wake up. "Let me go."

"I can't do that, not until they've arrived."

"They?" This was a distraction. When he said Elijah was coming, I didn't know he meant right now! "Let. Me. Go."

He closed his eyes. "Drew if you would just listen to reason-"

"Let me out Kol or I swear I'll never stop fighting you."

Kol sighed. "Don't run. It's only making it harder on yourself. Promise me you won't."

Yeah, no shit. "I promise."