by L. J. Smith
Chapter Twenty
This is way worse than the obstacle course, thought Matt.
And building a house out of newspaper. And the firewalk.
This is definitely the worst pledge event yet.
He twisted the toothbrush in his hand to real y get into the little niche running along the bottom of the paneling on the Vitale Society's pledge room wal s. The toothbrush came out black with ancient dirt and dangling cobwebs, and Matt grimaced in disgust. His back was already sore from hunching over.
"How's it going, soldier?" Chloe asked, squatting down next to him, a dripping sponge in one hand.
"Honestly, I'm not sure how scrubbing out this room is going to help us develop honor and leadership and al the stuff Ethan keeps talking about," Matt said. "I think this might just be a way to save a couple of bucks on a cleaning service. "
"Well, they say cleanliness is next to godliness," she reminded him. Chloe laughed. He real y liked her laugh. It was sort of bubbly and silvery.
Internal y, he gave himself a little eye rol . Bubbly and silvery. She had a nice laugh, was al he meant.
They'd been spending a lot of time together since Christopher's death. Matt had felt like nothing could be as bad as living with al of Christopher's stuff when Christopher himself was gone, but then Chris's parents came and packed it up, gently patting Matt on the back as if he deserved some kind of sympathy when they had lost their only son. And with just empty space where Christopher's things had been, everything was a mil ion times worse.
Meredith, Bonnie, and Elena had tried to comfort him.
They wanted so badly for him to be okay again that he'd felt guilty he wasn't, making it harder for him to be around them.
Chloe had taken to coming by the room, hanging out with him or getting him to come to the cafeteria or wherever with her, keeping him in touch with the world when he felt like locking himself away. There was something so easy about her. Elena, the only girl he'd ever loved - before now, part of him whispered - was much more work to be around.
Inside, he flinched at his own disloyalty to Elena, but it was true.
Now he was starting to wake up and take an interest in things again. And he kept noticing with fresh surprise the cute dimple Chloe had in her right cheek, or how shiny her curly dark hair was, or how graceful and pretty her hands were despite the fact that they were often stained with paint.
So far, though, they were just friends. Maybe . . . maybe it was time to change that.
Chloe snapped her fingers in front of his face, and Matt realized he had been staring at her. "You al right, buddy?" she asked, a little frown wrinkling her forehead, and Matt had to restrain himself from kissing her right then.
"Yeah, just spacing out," he said, feeling a flush creep over his cheeks. He was smiling like a goof, he knew.
"Want to help with these wal s?"
"Sure, why not?" Chloe answered. "I'l soap down the wal part, and you keep doing whatever you're doing there with that little toothbrush. "
They worked companionably together for a while, Chloe now and then accidental y-on-purpose dripping soapy water onto the top of Matt's head.
As they worked further along the paneling, the niche under the baseboard got deeper, until it was not so much a niche as a gap. Matt slid the toothbrush underneath to scrub - man, but it got grimy down there - and felt something shift.
"There's something under here," he told Chloe, pressing his hand flat against the floor and working his fingers into the gap. He slid his hands and the toothbrush around, trying to shimmy whatever was down there toward them, but he couldn't quite get a grip on it.
"Look," said Chloe after a moment, "I think the paneling might slide up here. " She wiggled the section of wood until it gave a raucous screech and she was able to work it up.
"Huh," she said, puzzled. "Wow, it's like a secret compartment. Seems like it hasn't been opened for a while, though. "
Once she managed to ease the paneling up, they could see the space behind it was smal , only a foot or so in height and width and a few inches deep. It was ful of cobwebs. Inside was something rectangular, wrapped in a cloth that had probably once been white but was now gray with dust.
"It's a book," Matt said, picking it up. The grime on the outside of the cloth was thick and soft and came away on his hands. Unwrapping it, he found the book inside was clean.
"Wow," Chloe said softly.
It looked old, real y old. The cover was flaking dark leather, and the edges of the pages were rough as if they'd been hand cut instead of by a machine. Tilting the book a little, Matt could see the remains of gilt that must have once been the title, but it was worn away now.
Matt opened it to the middle. Inside, it was handwritten, black ink inscribing neat strong strokes. And total y indecipherable.
"I think it's Latin. Maybe?" said Matt. "Do you know Latin at al ?"
Chloe shook her head. Matt flipped back to the first page, and one word popped out at him. Vitale.
"Maybe it's a history of the Vitale Society," Chloe said.
"Or ancient secrets of the founders. Cool! We should give it to Ethan. "
"Yeah, sure," Matt said, distracted. He turned a few more pages, and the ink changed from black to a dark brown. It looks like dried blood, he thought, and shuddered, then pushed the image away. It was just some kind of old ink, faded brown with time.
One word he recognized, written three - no, four - times on the page: Mort. That meant death, didn't it? Matt traced the word with his finger, frowning. Creepy.
"I'l show it to Ethan," Chloe said, jumping up and taking the book from him. She crossed the room and interrupted Ethan's conversation with another girl. From the other side of the room, Matt watched Ethan's face break into a slow smile as he took the book.
After a few minutes, Chloe returned, grinning. "Ethan was real y excited," she said. "He said he'l tel us al about it after he gets someone to translate the book. " Matt nodded. "That's terrific," he said, pushing the last of his unease away. This was Chloe, lively, laughing Chloe, and he would try not to think about death or blood or anything morbid around her. "Hey," he said, pushing away the dark thoughts, focusing on the golden highlights in her dark hair. "Are you going to the party at McAl ister House tonight?"
Maybe not pulled back, Elena thought, looking critical y at herself in the mirror. She tugged the barrette out of her hair and let her golden locks tumble, sleek and flat-ironed, down around her shoulders. Much better.
She looked good, she noted, running her eyes dispassionately over her reflection. Her strappy short black dress accentuated her rose-petal skin and pale hair, and her dark blue eyes seemed huge.
Without Stefan, though, what did it matter how she looked?
She watched her own mouth tighten in the mirror as she pushed the thought away. However much she missed the feeling of Stefan's hand in hers, his lips on hers, however much she wanted to be with him, it was impossible for now.
She couldn't be Katherine. And her pride wouldn't let her just mope around, either. It's not forever, she told herself grimly.
Bonnie came up and threw her arm around Elena's shoulders, regarding them both in the mirror. "We clean up nice, don't we?" she asked cheerful y. "Ready to go?"
"You do look amazing," Elena said, looking at Bonnie with affection. The shorter girl was practical y glowing with excitement - eyes sparkling, smile bright, cheeks flushed, mane of red hair flying out seemingly with a life of its own -
and her short blue dress and strappy high-heeled shoes were adorable. Bonnie's smile got bigger.
"Let's get going," Meredith said, al business. She was sleek and practical in jeans and a soft fitted gray shirt that matched her eyes. It was hard to know what Meredith was thinking, but Elena had overheard her murmuring to Alaric on the phone late at night. She figured that Meredith, at heart, might not be into the party either.
Outside, people w
alked quickly in large, silent groups, glancing around nervously as they went. No one lingered, no one was alone.
Meredith stopped midstride and stiffened, suddenly aware of a potential threat. Elena fol owed her gaze. She was wrong: one person lingered alone. Damon was sitting on a bench outside their dorm, his face tipped toward the sky as if he was basking in the sun despite the darkness of the evening.
"What do you want, Damon?" Meredith said, warily. Her voice wasn't actual y rude - they'd gotten past that, working together this summer - but it wasn't friendly, and Elena could feel her bristling beside her.
"Elena, of course," Damon said lazily, rising and smoothly taking Elena's arm.
Bonnie looked back and forth between them, puzzled. "I thought you weren't going to spend time with either of them for a while," she said to Elena.
Damon spoke quietly into Elena's ear. "It's about the Vitale Society. I've got a lead. "
Elena hesitated. She hadn't told her friends about the hints she and Damon had found that the Vitale Society might be more than a myth, or that they might be connected to her parents in some way. There wasn't real y anything much to go on yet, and she didn't feel quite ready to talk about the possibility that her parents might have been mixed up in some kind of dark secret or how she felt, seeing the images of them when they were young.
Making up her mind, she turned to Meredith and Bonnie. "I've got to go with Damon for a minute. It's important. I'l explain it to you guys later. See you at the party in a little bit. "
Meredith frowned but nodded, and she steered Bonnie toward McAl ister House. As they went, Elena could hear Bonnie saying, "But wasn't the whole point. . . " Keeping his hand tucked firmly under Elena's arm, Damon led her in the opposite direction. "Where are we going?" she asked, feeling too aware of the softness of Damon's skin and the strength of his grip.
"I saw a girl wearing one of those pins from the photo," Damon answered. "I fol owed her to the library, but once she got inside, she just disappeared. I looked everywhere for her. Then, an hour later, she came out the library doors again. Remember when I said we needed to look for answers somewhere other than the library?" He smiled. "I was wrong. There's something going on in there. "
"Maybe you just didn't see her?" Elena wondered aloud.
"It's a big library, she could have been tucked away in a study carrel or something. "
"I would have found her," Damon said briefly. "I'm good at finding people. " His teeth shone white for a moment under the streetlights.
The problem was that the library was so normal. Once they were inside, Elena looked around at the gray-carpeted floors, the beige chairs, the rows and rows of bookshelves, the buzzing fluorescent lights. It was a place to study. It didn't look like any secrets were hidden here.
"Upstairs?" she suggested.
They took the stairs rather than the elevator and worked their way down from the top floor. Going from floor to floor, they found . . . nothing. People reading and taking notes.
Books, books, and more books. In the basement, there was a room of vending machines and smal tables for study breaks. Nothing unexpected.
Elena paused in a hal way of administrative offices near the vending machine. "We're not going to find anything," she told Damon. His face twisted in frustration, and she added, "I believe you that there's something going on here, I do, but without any leads, we don't even know what we're looking for yet. "
The door behind her, marked Research Office, opened, and Matt came out.
He looked tired, and Elena felt a quick flash of guilt.
After Christopher's death, she and Meredith and Bonnie had meant to stick close to Matt. But he was always busy with footbal or class and didn't seem to want them around.
She realized with a shock that she hadn't talked to him in days.
"Oh, hey, Elena," Matt said, looking startled. "Are you going to the party tonight?" He greeted Damon with an awkward nod.
"Mutt," Damon acknowledged, giving a half smile, and Matt rol ed his eyes.
As they chatted about the party and classes and Bonnie's new semiboyfriend, Elena cataloged her impressions of Matt. Tired, yes - his eyes were a little bloodshot, and there was grimness to his lips that hadn't been there a few weeks ago. But why did he smel so strongly of soap? It wasn't like he was particularly clean, she thought, inspecting a grubby trail tracing down Matt's cheek to his neck. It looked like something had been dripped on his head. It was almost like he had been cleaning something. Something real y dirty.
Struck by a new thought, she glanced at his chest.
Surely he wouldn't be wearing one of the V pins? As if aware of what she was wondering, Matt pul ed his jacket more tightly around him.
"What were you doing in that office?" she asked him abruptly.
"Uh. " Matt's face was blank for half a second, and then he glanced up at the door, at the sign saying Research Office. "Research, of course," he said. "I've got to go," he added. "I'l catch you at the party later, okay, Elena?" He had half turned away, when Elena impulsively put out her hand to catch his arm. "Where have you been, Matt?" she asked. "I've hardly seen you lately. " Matt grinned, but he didn't quite meet her eyes.
"Footbal ," he said. "Col ege bal 's a big deal. " He gently pul ed away from her restraining hand. "Later, Elena. Damon. "
They watched him walk away, and then Damon nodded toward the door Matt had come out of. "Shal we?" he said.
"Shal we what?" Elena asked, puzzled.
"Oh, like that wasn't suspicious," Damon said. He put his hand on the knob, and Elena heard the lock snap as he forced it open.
Inside was a very boring room. A desk, a chair, a smal rug on the floor.
Maybe a little too boring?
"A research office without books? Or even a computer?" Elena asked. Damon cocked his head to one side, considering, then, with a swift movement, pul ed aside the rug.
Below it was the clear outline of a trapdoor. "Bingo," Elena breathed. She stepped forward, already bending down to try and pry it open, but Damon pul ed her back.
"Whoever is using this could stil be down there," he said. "Matt just left, and I doubt he was alone. " Matt. Whatever was going on, Matt knew about it.
"Maybe I should talk to him," Elena said.
Damon frowned. "Let's wait until we know what we're dealing with," he said. "We don't know what Matt's involvement is. This could be dangerous for you. " He had taken hold of her arm again and was pul ing her gently, steadily out of the room. "We'l come back later. " Elena let him lead her away, grappling with what he'd said. Dangerous? she thought. Surely Matt wouldn't be doing anything that would be a danger to Elena?
