Klaus stands behind the counter having a drink without hurry, there is a small smile on his lips as the fat man wearing a white suit lights up his cigar, he knows the man from way back when Mikael was trying to sell his mother's pearls to pay for the gambling debts, this sick bastard was a loan shark at the time but married well and now owns one of the truck companies that the Mikaelsons use to move their forbidden alcohol around.
"I'm just proposing that we do a little adjustment in our arrangement. Your father was already taking up a large portion of the profit but he was well-respected and old in this business so we didn't make any waves. Now with you... we don't know enough to leave retirement funds on your hands." the man makes a long pull from his cigar and openly defies Klaus.
A bad move he is about to regret.
Klaus was just a little kid when he started doing errands for the big names in Chicago and by age 15 he was doing so much money that he started his own side business of smuggling cigars, it was a sour frustration for Mikael that a brat was making more money than him and he took it out on Klaus cruelly, it was a matter of time before Klaus developed a hard skin to it all.
Also at 17 Klaus is a rich man with a nag to survive his father and to do better than him in everything, Klaus made a name for himself so what this fat rat is implying is rubbing Klaus in a particular wrong way.
"You are absolutely right, it's time to rethink the deal my family holds with your company." Klaus says with an uncanny smile.
The man is suddenly nervous as two strong men stop behind him. "The Mayor is my personal friend, he has a special interest in this meeting." the man says trying to win some leverage out of a bad scenario.
Klaus rests his glass slowly on the counter. "You are in my joint now, I couldn't care less if you had the Pope in your bed."
The man gulps down as the younger crazy brother joins the party. "All right, look... someone is making a lot of pressure to stop all connections to you, Johnny Sweet Cheeks tried to tell them no and they burned all of his trucks last week. He's out of business now and I ain't gonna go down that road for 10% of profit."
Klaus looks at Kol and the two of them share a smile, their list of enemies is as long as the tallest building Chicago has and it just keeps on growing.
"It's not that I don't want to keep my business with you Klaus, it's just that I might need a little incentive..." the man hauls another long draw from his cigar.
Kol snaps his suspenders loudly next to Klaus, he's getting impatient and that is never a good thing with Kol, Klaus chuckles when Kol goes for his beloved bat.
His young brother is too attached to that wooden piece, Kol has a mean right arm and he even made it into the White Sox but his bad temper always got him into trouble and unnecessary fights within his own team so that lasted for only a season, Klaus suspects that Kol uses the bat as his pillow.
"Don't worry sheik, I'll give you the incentive that you need." Kol says with a smile.
The man nervously laughs. "Now, there's no reason to get all worked up Kol.I have a bit of a situation at home, my wife is in charge of the company and I had a little indiscretion with a young toots that she found out about, since then she cut me dry and I need the money for my smoke."
"That's really not my problem, is it?" Klaus confronts him.
The man puts out his cigar, he's too nervous to keep smoking. "I'm just asking for a little more money, after all it's a risk that I'm taking by keeping our partnership going." he pleads knowing by now that he's walking away with a few broken fingers, if he is that lucky.
"Why don't you ask your friend the Mayor for a loan?" Klaus asks flipping his hand in the air.
The man fretfully laughs when Kol leaves the counter. "No need to make things worse, I'm sure that we can work something out."
"I'm sure that we will." Kol looks at Klaus waiting for his permission.
Klaus leans his head a little and that's all that it takes.
The two thugs grab the fat man from behind and then he is on the ground at Kol's scarce mercy.
Klaus comes near the poor rat and crouches to look at him directly, his silver necklace dangles before the man's blurry vision. "I don't care who's trying to mess with us or how many trucks they have to burn to peak my attention, if they step into my backyard I will go after them and I will kill every last one of them, then their families and their pets. Now when you go back to your wife, you send her to me, I don't do business with weasels and she sounds a lot smarter and braver than you are."
The man nods eager to leave with his life and just a broken arm but Kol has a short temper and he's trying to make a name for himself as well so he makes sure that the man remembers his name when he's done with him.
It's another cold day but Klaus doesn't go for his coat, he likes the cold in his bones because it makes him feel alive, he closes the front door of the bar and it muffles the screams as Kol breaks some more bones.
Klaus narrows his eyes away from the smoke of his cigarette when the brown car stops in front of him, coppers at Room 21 is just a regular routine but Klaus smiles watching the gumshoe that steps down from the car, this face is a familiar one.
Caroline likes the mornings at the Club after a good busy night, it's just her and the girls that work there and it gives her time to catch up with the gossip.
She smiles at Bonnie and sits by the counter asking for coffee, and her friend easily finds the time to talk to her.
"Hey, everything ok?" Bonnie knows her well enough to know that Caroline is having a blue day.
Caroline simply shakes her head and plays with the feather in the pink hat that she is holding in her hands. "Nik is in town." she says it low, like she's too afraid to say it out loud.
Bonnie's green eyes come to life. "Nik? The Nik you told me about?"
Caroline nods silently, there are only three people in whom she has confided the truth, Bonnie is one of them.
"Have you told him yet?" Bonnie asks carefully.
Caroline's eyes look for hers in fear that she might regret confiding in her but Bonnie smiles reassuring her that she is keeping her secret locked away.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Bonnie asks sweetly.
"I've been in love with Nik since I was 14 and he's been the only man I've loved in my entire life but he has also been the one who hurt me the most and now he's back to torment me." Caroline says with all that pain pounding inside of her chest.
"A lot has happened since then Caroline." Bonnie says trying to sooth her friend. "Who knows, maybe there's still a chance to reconnect, it's been so long and people change Caroline."
Caroline smiles into her black coffee, Niklaus Mikaelson is the exception to that.
She gets up and after gently squeezing Bonnie's hand she makes her way to the dressing rooms but she knows that Matt isn't around and after a careful double-check, she goes into his empty office.
Caroline heads instantly to his desk, she skims through the papers on top of it fast but doesn't find what she is looking for, she knows that she has little time so she checks the drawers quickly, she smiles when she sees his handwriting and quickly tries to memorize the date scribbled on it.
A noise makes her move quickly and put everything back like it was before, she makes her way to the door and smiles when she sees Alaric. "Good morning, I was looking for Matt." she sweetly conveys some innocence.
Alaric gives her a suspicious look, he never liked the broad, she can't be trusted but his boss is head over heels for her. "You know that he doesn't come by on Thursdays." he simply says and looks around the office suspicious.
Caroline shakes her head laughing. "It's Thursday already? God, I'm such a clutz."
Alaric steps in front of her as she tries to leave.
She looks at him without fear. "Yes?"
"Boss saw you talking to a man in the back alley, who was that?"
"I can't even remember his name anymore, just some random Joe who liked my songs." she flashes a perfect smile and leaves the office.
Alaric isn't convinced a tiny bit and decides to follow her tonight after she leaves the Club, she's up to something and he is set on finding out exactly what.
"Stefan Salvatore… or should I call you Detective Salvatore?" Klaus playfully inquires.
Stefan takes off his long brown coat, he takes his gun as well from the holster and leaves it on top of the table, Room 21 is the only place he feels comfortable enough to do it and only when Klaus is around. "You can call me doll if you want to, I'm still a handsome son of a bitch no matter what you name me." Stefan holds two empty glasses for them while Klaus looks for the good booze.
"I'm not that desperate yet Stefan." Klaus simply says and shows his old friend the bottle.
Stefan smiles liking the color of it, he loves the taste even more as it burns all the way down to his lungs. "When were you planning on coming to see me?" he asks offended.
Klaus smiles. "It's going to take a miracle on my behalf to walk willingly into the Big House."
"Could have come by my house then, Katherine would be happy to see you again."
"Your wife hates me and she would probably put two in my chest before I even crossed the doorstep." Klaus says at ease.
"Yeah, you probably right." Stefan replies and they both end up laughing.
What an odd pair of friends, best friends as kids and although Klaus turned to one side of the law and Stefan to the other, they still remained close as brothers.
"Have you been to the Green Mill yet?" Stefan asks aware of how sensitive the subject is going to be.
"Yes, I have seen Caroline already." Klaus simply answers regardless of knowing that Stefan won't settle for that.
"She's really famous now, the Club has been riding high on her success and she gets a big piece of it all." Stefan informs Klaus, even if he doesn't ask him to.
"What can you tell me about Matt Donovan?" Klaus asks serious.
Stefan tenses a little in his chair. "Don't do this Nik."
"Relax Stefan." he says with a dark smile. "Can't a fella ask around?"
"His goon has been asking an awful lot of questions about you as well." Stefan says and is dead serious as he leans over the table. "I can look the other way every time that your brother decides to play baseball with the criminal faces that live in this town but if you start butting heads with one of the Mayor's closest friends, this will end in a bloodbath and I won't be able to keep it clean Nik."
Klaus raises his hands. "I'm just curious about the kid... and this Mayor character? Everyone seems to be in his good graces, I'm beginning to feel left out and wounded by his ignoring ways." Klaus says easily, he knows that Stefan lives for his job but some bonds are stronger than blood and Stefan owes him his life.
"She has the right to move on Nik." Stefan says calmly and changing the subject that he has no interest to carry on.
"So everyone keeps telling me..."
"Actually you two are a match, both so stubborn to realize that you can't live without each other." Stefan shakes his head.
Klaus doesn't answer him straight away, he drowns his words with another drink.
Kol taps his friend's chest playfully as two dashing girls walk by them laughing and playing with their long pearl-necklaces. "Not bad huh?" Kol teases him some more and then sits on a stool turning his attention to the girl walking their way.
"Good evening boys." Bonnie greets them with a natural beaming smile.
"Good evening Miss Bonnie." the young kid replies respectfully.
Kol and Bonnie laugh because he looks endearing.
"Never mind my shy virgin bud Jeremy." Kol chuckles.
The Gilbert kid blushes and clutches his flat grey hat with a jitter, he still gets nervous when he is around so many beautiful women and how they all are wearing very short and bright dresses.
Then he sees Caroline Forbes, his idol and points at her without being able to speak, Kol laughs with his reaction, he really has to introduce Jeremy to her one of these days.
Life is funny that way, one day she is drooling over his brother and helping her mother so that she can spend time in the house and the other she's singing and dancing for an admiring crowd.
Bonnie brings them two glasses of Scotch and Kol snaps from his memories, he laughs hard when Jeremy chokes on it and tries to politely cough while covering his mouth, he really needs to toughen up the kid.
Bonnie smiles at him briefly before turning around to fix a drink for another man and Kol checks her out shamelessly, he likes the view and he likes the girl, she's feisty and she's putting up a fight, just the kind that makes him lose sleep.
"When will you go out with me Bonnie?" he asks when she comes around for the ice.
She grins. "Never."
"Never is such a negative word darling." he says pretending sadness.
She laughs holding an ice-cube in her palm, she turns her hand around and places it on top of the counter and teases him. "Here, I think that you are going to need something like this to cool down all that steam."
Kol is amused by her. "Believe me darling, it will take a lot more than this to cool me down."
"Then I suggest that you start looking for another girl to heat up because Caroline warned me all about you Kol Mikaelson." she says laughing.
Kol grimaces in his place, the little blonde traitor.
I don't know how I got here but I'm here again, against my will and better reason, I toss my cigarette away and go inside the Club knowing that this is just another nail to my wooden box.
She's singing already and I stay in the shadows watching her this time, I don't bother going for a drink, I let the pain consume me instead.
Her voice is sweet and she is slowly singing about love and heartache, things that my blond demon is an expert at.
I don't stay for her final act, I can't.
I've been through a lot with Caroline to know that the longer I stay near her, the harder it is to pull away from her.
I'm already by the door when a tall fella steps in front of me, I suddenly remember it's rude to shoot someone without asking their name first.
Yes, I'm having one of those nights.
"Can I help you sweetheart?" I ask enjoying the way that his neck vein seems ready to pop up, some men really can't take a joke.
"My boss wants a quick word with you." he nods towards the table at the end of the floor, with the privileged view to the stage where Caroline still sings and shines to my great torment.
I smile at the sweetheart. "I can't sing, sorry."
"He wants to talk to you, not hire you." the tall closet tells me.
Not the sharpest pencil around but then again the lack of brains comes with every set of broad shoulders in this town.
"I already told him the other night that I'm not interested." I say and walk around him to leave.
The idiot stops me with his hand on my shoulder, he's really that dumb.
I'm indecisive between shooting him between the eyes or plainly taking out on him my special pissy mood tonight.
The lights come up, my demon has finished her number and is getting the standing ovation that she deserves, the cheerful sounds give me the chance that I need and I smile because I know that this is going to hurt.
I fetch for my gun concealed in my suit and I smack his nose with it, he starts yelling while I shove him back but before he knows what really hit him, I'm all over him in the men's loo.
When I'm done with him I clean my gun slowly and drop the towel smeared with his blood down on his face.
"I hate repeating myself so do try remembering this time. Tell your boss that I'll talk to him when he grows a scruff and leaves puberty."
I pack my heat again and check myself in the mirror, I fix my tie under the suit vest and then my black hat, tilting it just that bit and then leave the moaning sorry ass lying on the cold floor, I flirt with the choir girls dressed with the really skimpy dresses and the black stockings and step outside into the cold.
As I wrap my fingers around a cigarette I smile, my mood has improved substantially.
I go home but I don't go up to my bedroom, instead I stay downstairs in the bar and sit by a table in the dark for it's where I'm most comfortable at.
Her face keeps burning in my eyes and I want to dig them out, for now the rest of the bottle that I didn't finish with Stefan is helping me ease the urge.
I take my jacket off and roll my shirt sleeves up and lit another one of my beloved cigarettes, Elijah claims that it will kill me one day and I believe him, just that I rather die of something I enjoy than from a coward bullet with my name on it.
It's not raining tonight but it's a cold night nonetheless and it makes me miss New Orleans, the hot nights is what I miss the most.
It was easy making Louisiana my home, I was away from everything that I hated, away from everything that haunts me in this town but I was also away from her, I know that I will have to admit it to myself one day that she is the reason I came back to this forsaken place but not tonight.
Only that my blond demon with the red lips has never been predictable and she takes me by surprise when she knocks on my door, for a minute there I believe that it's just the alcohol working its magic but no hallucination is this precise.
Caroline is standing at my door with a beautiful pink dress, her heavy expensive coat is in her arm and her pink hat in her hands, and the sweet irony is that she holds my heart in there as well, she can easily crush it and there's not a bloody thing I can do about it because she is in front of me and all that I can think about is kissing her and taking her upstairs to my bed.
"Can I talk to you?"
Her voice is velvet and her eyes are two huge pleading pearls, they are green tonight and they are far more dangerous than a loaded gun.
I hold the door for her and there's no hesitation as she comes inside, if anything my demon is fearless.
"It looks exactly the same…" Caroline takes a long look around.
Cities, streets, houses never change, just like people, you can change the color of the walls as many times as you wish but you can never change its foundation.
Maybe the exception is Caroline, she's prettier now than she ever was.
"What do you want Caroline?" I finally ask, having her this close is ruining my previous improved mood.
"You were again at the Club tonight." she says looking at me.
Her eyes are scanning my face and I wish that I knew what they are seeing.
"I like the joint, even if it's expensive." I say easily and then I can't help myself as the words leave my lips. "Just like a lot of things in there."
Caroline reacts to my words with a sting in her eyes. "What you did to Alaric was a mistake... just like coming here..." she says and gets ready to leave.
But I can't stop myself and block her exit with my body. "Why are you with that Donovan kid?"
She faces me with a cutting smile. "You lost every right to be jealous ten years ago, Klaus."
"I'm not jealous sweetheart, I'm disappointed at you for becoming a moll." I know that my words are filled with bitterness but it sure beats slapping her around.
"Matt is not a gangster." she says between her teeth obviously angry.
"You still his girl?" I ask clenching my jaw and I'm surprised words even come out at this point.
"I am many things and none of them concerns you."
She throws at me and I'm stunned that she doesn't call me Klaus again.
"Why are you here?"
To torture me, I know, still I ask.
"Matt has been very generous with me…" she starts.
"I bet with good reason love." I stop her.
Still she keeps going. "And he won't be happy if he finds out about us."
"What is there to know?" I ask holding on to a stupid hope that I should despise.
"That it's over." she says locking her eyes with mine.
"Then why are you worried love?"
"I'm not and I don't want you to start having any ideas."
I realize that she's faltering, maybe because I'm still holding her wrist in my hand.
"You are the one who came to me tonight, not the other way around Caroline." My voice is faltering as well, I miss her more than I have lied to myself.
She licks her lips and it takes everything inside of me not to make her scream my name on top of the first hard surface that I find.
"I came to tell you that all that happened between us ended the day that you decided to leave, so stop going to the Green Mill to watch me sing." she says determined.
"You are public property now sweetheart." my betrayed heart spits out.
She gets away from me hurt and I let her go.
I know that I went too far but I don't care, I'm mad at her for putting all of this on me.
I left because my father was a drunk low-life who used to beat up my mother until Elijah was old enough to defend her.
He drove my mother to madness and she killed herself with a gunshot, painting Kol's bedroom with her blood on the walls; he was just a baby and his only memory of our mother is her shooting her brains out in front of his crib.
None of us were given a fair chance, we were all born into this life one way or another and when I finally had enough and wanted to start a new life with Caroline she had doubts, the only time that I needed Caroline to tell me yes without thinking she said no and I was so battered by it that I left set on erasing her from my life.
Alas crime runs in my blood, I was born on the wrong side of the tracks and I will die there, so I did what I do best, I made money for my family and I thought of her every day and every night.
I run after Caroline to find her close by, she's sniffling hurt with my words and when I cut her way she doesn't say anything, she just looks at me blankly and I see the girl that I fell in love with.
The same girl who used to sneak into the bar while her mother did the cleaning on the house just to see me.
Caroline used to chase me around until she turned 16 and then I was the one chasing after her, I was Caroline's first man when she turned 18 and I haven't truly been with another woman since that night, not enough to feel anything at least.
There is only one woman who had me completely, it's hard forgetting a woman like Caroline and she knows it.
"He didn't buy me, I didn't sell myself but I am with him now." Caroline says.
I can't tell if it's sorrow or anger that she's pretending.
"He's a kid, you need a man." I tell her noticing the way that she lands her big eyes on the ground away from my hard eyes.
"This city takes no prisoners Klaus and those who were left behind learned how to adapt, Matt has very important people backing him up and you will end up hurt if you keep ignoring him and his polite requests to talk to you."
"I thought that you said that he wasn't a gangster." I point out her fat lie.
She smiles sweetly and I feel my chest ache by such a vision.
"I also told myself every night for the past ten years that I hated you and that I was over you."
Her honesty makes my heart speed.
"Why did you really come here for Caroline?" I ask so close to her face that I can feel her breath on my lips.
"I came here to tell you to be careful Nik."
I cup her face smiling, she finally whispers the name that I have longed to hear from her but painfully she removes my hand from her face, rejects my touch and pulls herself together. "I belong to Matt now."
The words wound me more than I'm prepared to endure and it hurts when she walks away from me for the second time tonight, I grab her hand in instinct and she slowly looks at me.
"Don't do that again." she begs me.
"Don't fool yourself Caroline, you will always be mine." I say before releasing her.
Caroline says nothing, she just walks away closing her coat, it always feels cold when you sell your soul to the devil.
Soundtrack :
Cry me a river - Ella Fitzgerald