Author's note: Huge thanks as always to everyone who reviewed, faved, or followed! I'm actually always excited to update this story because of you guys.


Welcome to the Underworld

3

The scent of Atlanta was laced with Caroline. She was definitely still here. Klaus could smell her everywhere. And after compelling a few humans and flashing Caroline's picture, they were shortly headed to downtown towards a hotel called The Loews.

He doubted she would have stayed under her real name, but she probably wasn't trying to hide too hard. Definitely wasn't, he considered, not with the way she'd left her scent all through the city like this, probably feeding from people and covering it up every few feet. He compelled the concierge to let him see a guest log and he spied where she was quickly: Pussy Galore, The Penthouse.

Klaus was still in a rage but Marcel couldn't help but chuckle at what he saw over his friend's shoulder.

"I can see why you like her, man!" Marcel laughed. "That's funny. A Bond fan and everything!"

"There is nothing funny about the situation we are in right now," he spat, turning on his heel and pressing the up button on the elevator far more times than was conceivably necessary. It arrived a second later and Klaus forced his way in, shoving aside some startled exiting tourists.

On the top floor, before the elevator doors even opened, they heard the music blasting. He'd come up only with Marcel, Elijah, and Rebekah. Rebekah had been a last second choice, wondering if perhaps he might need a woman's mind in this endeavor. Caroline was proving to be quite difficult to manage like this. The rest of the hotel's floors were all being covered, just in case she made any move to evade them again.

The doors opened and they were assaulted by the music: a strong 60s bassline with some psychedelic piano and guitar. The lyrics started and he recognized it immediately as Sunshine Superman by Donovan.

"Sunshine came softly through my window today…"

Klaus had no idea Caroline even listened to music like this — she'd always struck him as more of a country and Beyonce-type girl. The more he saw of her without her humanity, the less he realized he knew about her. Seeing a vampire at their worst was very much like seeing the most intimate recesses of their soul, if you were diligent enough.

"It'll take time I know it but, in awhile, you're gonna be mine I know it, we'll do it in style…"

The ridiculously cheery tune was a sour clash with the anger coursing through him. His three companions were clearly on edge around him like this. The Penthouse had the floor to itself and her door was the only one present down a long corridor from the elevator. He didn't knock or hesitate. He just broke the door down with an infuriated kick.

"Well, that hardly seemed necessary," Rebekah commented from behind him as they all followed him into the room.

Caroline was dancing on top of the dead, literally. All the windows in the room were wide open as the blonde bounced up and down on the hotel's bed, two lifeless, eyeless, and bloodied male bodies bouncing along with her. One of their eyes I had rolled to the foot of the bed and another was resting on the bedside table that Caroline had appropriated as an ashtray. She was barely clothed, again, in her underwear with one of the men's collared shirts resting unbuttoned on her shoulders. She had the top sheet of the bed in her hands, waving it around her as she moved, allowing it to billow out like a dancers ribbon around her. She had a joint hanging out the side of her bloodied mouth and a half empty bottle of champagne was resting on the bedside table, amongst the ashes and the eye, next to her.

"Well, hey there Pussy!" Marcel called out from behind him and was quickly silenced by a vicious glare from Klaus.

When she saw him, she didn't falter or get embarrassed. She merely hopped off the bed, dancing like she was in Pulp Fiction, trailing her fingers in a peace symbol across her eyes, and started sashaying towards him while softly accompanying the music:

"Cause I've made my mind up, you're going to be mine."

Oh, she knew what she was doing. She twirled around to turn the sound down with a remote that had fallen to the floor and faced him, still swaying to the lowered music.

"There you are! What took you so long?" she demanded.

He was absolutely flabbergasted, a sensation that only eased up to be replaced again by rage and jealousy when he spied the unclothed and bloodied men left in Caroline's bed. Without thinking, he lunged at them, his wolf senses kicking in. He could smell her all over their bodies. In a fit, a strangled growl escaped his throat, and his fangs descended as he began ripping their lifeless bodies needlessly apart with his bare hands.

Caroline watched from the side with a minimal amount of interest.

"Um, news flash stud, they're already dead," she commented.

He looked up, still infuriated. He turned towards his siblings and Marcel.

"Round up everyone and go home. Leave a few people to stay behind and clean this up," he said, looking towards the bloody , eyeless pile beneath him. "Compel everyone in the hotel if you have to. We'll meet you back home later."

His siblings and Marcel nodded dutifully, but clearly put out about the day's needless goose chase, and left the room. Rebekah had a disgusted scowl on her face, her time wasted. Marcel looked genuinely perplexed over what Klaus was willing to put up with for this girl. Only Elijah's eyes flashed a sense of amusement. He could see exactly how much this new version of Caroline was getting to his typically unflappable and unforgiving brother; he even thought it might be good for Klaus. New Orleans had not been kind to Klaus since he returned and he'd built up a tough emotional shell that Elijah was worried would one day send Klaus off the deep end. And despite his understanding of Klaus's anger, he couldn't help but notice that the unpredictable actions of a switched-off Caroline were exactly everything his brother had ever professed to want from a woman before.

"I can't believe this," Rebekah fumed. She shot a look to Caroline before they exited. "This is the only time I will ever be looking out for you again, do you understand? So you'd better tread wisely."

Klaus could see that Caroline didn't believe a word of it and truthfully he didn't either. When push came to shove, Rebekah always came through for her family and that included Klaus. Not to mention, he'd rarely had a hard time manipulating her to do anything in the last millennia.

Once their group had exited, Klaus whirled on the still dancing Caroline.

"Where the hell have you been?" he growled at her, stalking over to her only to pace around her like a predator. She wasn't perturbed.

"Uh, maybe escaping from this apparent kidnapping fest?" she deadpanned. "Since when did my visit become both mandatory and permanent?"

Klaus balked at her, unbelieving her gall . "That's not the point!" he insisted. "You can leave but not just out of the blue, that was one of the conditions of my hosting you… that you'd be a decent guest. Decent does not include disappearing without a word!" Not that she could really leave, of course, but if she didn't think she was on lockdown she'd have no need to run.

"Oh, so just because I broke the 'decent guest' clause, that gives you the right to totally wig out on me and go secret service on my ass?" she yelled right back. "Not to mention, said 'decent' clause was contingent upon your promise not to harass me about why I'd turned off my humanity!"

Klaus actually had to pause at this one. Something about Caroline without her humanity had made her even quicker than she was before. She was like a lawyer now. He made a motion to respond but she stopped him by putting her hand up while she took a slow last puff of a joint, stubbing it out, and immediately lighting a cigarette in its stead.

"Look, I'm glad you came to get me," she said. "I didn't really want to ride that smelly old bus all the way to Atlanta and then back. I just needed to blow off some steam."

He smiled down at her, everything forgiven the moment she'd admitted she was actually glad to see him, unable to help the adoration he felt. He wasn't a fool, it was clearly a bid to get herself out of trouble but he honestly couldn't stop the flood of his reaction when she's said that. Even like this, she constantly projected an easy Holly Golightly-element about her.

And she hadn't really made it difficult to find her. Given the ease of her slipping from NOLA without notice, he knew she could have.

"We heard there were several murders where the victims had their eyes gouged out," he commented, looking towards the eyeless men left in her bed. "What was that about?"

"Everything is scarier in the dark," she replied in a sing-song voice. Klaus felt a smirk appear; even if she was trouble like this, he did enjoy this new wicked side. "So, am I forgiven?" she asked, looking up at him with a sensual pout.

She thought she had his answer locked down but, he threw her a curveball.

"Well?" he asked her, "Did you leave Virginia and turn off your humanity because of Stefan Salvatore?"

Caroline scowled.

"I don't want to talk about why I left or why I shut it off!" she screamed at him. "Can't you just be satisfied that I'm here now?"

"You left!" he insisted.

"Only because you didn't respect the one rule I had for my staying!"

Klaus sighed wearily and rubbed his temples. "Caroline, if you remember it was you that came to me!"

"Well, to your city," she cut in, knowing she was being pedantic by trying to continue any charade suggesting she hadn't come for him.

He rolled his eyes and ignored the interruption. "I don't have time to be running after you right now. I just finished off a fight with my most troubling sibling, another sister has come back from the dead, my daughter's life is constantly in peril… And to top it all off, Kol is dead thanks to our brother Finn and no one has any idea how to bring him back!" Klaus finished in a huff.

Caroline, who had sat back down on her bloodied bed, leaned her head on her fist thoughtfully and looked Klaus fully in the eyes. Her face and tone serious, she said, "You are concerned about him."

"As unlikely as it may seem, yes. I am concerned about Kol," he confided.

"You believe his health might be at stake," she continued.

He quirked his head, confused. "He's dead, Caroline. His health is sort of beside the point." Something clicked in Klaus's mind. This diatribe was very familiar.

"Caroline… are you quoting The Shining at me?" he asked, baffled.

She dropped the serious Nicholson impression and her demeanor shifted back to the happy-go-lucky careless Caroline she had been before. "It's a great movie, Klaus," she said, without explanation. "We should watch it later."

He ignored the random request. Vampires who shut off their emotions were known for being flighty in their thoughts, particularly if they were being forced to respond to an emotional conversation. And apparently Caroline didn't care in the slightest about the revelations on Finn, Freya, and Kol.

"Look we'll deal with… everything in time. Are you ready to go home?" he ask impatiently, reaching out for her hand.

She just looked at it and did not reach back, before standing and walking to the door with him trailing behind. "I don't have a home, Klaus."


The car ride back to New Orleans was made mostly in steely silence. Caroline refused to put out either the cigarettes or the joints that she seemed to light up minute by minute. Occasionally, she'd remove a flask from the breast pocket of the shirt she'd stolen off one of the male humans and take a swig. He declined to comment on her unseemly habits.

"How did you make it to Atlanta so quickly?" he asked her once they pulled back up to The Abattoir a few hours later.

"Do you not have even a basic conception of the layout of America's east coast?" she asked, annoyed. "It's only a three hour train ride from Richmond to New Orleans. The bus up to Georgia was nothing, even if it was smelly."

"That's not what I meant," Klaus snapped right back. "You had been gone for hours by the time I even realized you had left the city. How did you manage to sneak out without anyone noticing?"

Caroline winked at him after he helped her out of the car. "Like I told you last night, I'm very sneaky without my humanity turned off. You called me capricious then too; you had no idea how apt the term was."

So, humanity-less Caroline had her intelligence heightened to its maximum potential, apparently, regardless of whether or not she was high or drunk. That was something to keep in mind. He'd always known she was smart and fiercely strong and independent — those were some of her qualities he'd always found most attractive. But with her emotions switched off, all of her best aspects suddenly transformed into a weapon… and Caroline was clearly always poised to remain in self-defense mode for the foreseeable future.

Elijah and Rebekah had arrived ahead of them. Klaus noticed Elijah's car when they pulled up.

They stepped inside and were welcomed by Rebekah's sarcasm, as biting as always, even in a new body with a new voice.

"Caroline! So nice of you to join us, you definitely didn't waste any of our time today!" she called out.

"Rebekah," the blonde called out in greeting to his sister seriously before casually draping an arm around her shoulders. Caroline sighed into Rebekah's ear, loudly. "You can't respect somebody who kisses your ass. It just doesn't work!"

With that she lay a loud, resounding smack of a kiss onto Rebekah's cheek and walked upstairs without another word. Rebekah looked at Klaus in confusion while Elijah chuckled from the sidelines.

"Did she just quote… Ferris Bueller at me?" Rebekah asked.

"She's on a bit of a film kick today, apparently," Klaus growled, slamming the door behind him and crashing onto the couch in the nearest living room. They heard Caroline's door slam upstairs and Klaus groaned again. "I honestly don't know what to make of her like this."

Elijah and Rebekah watched from the sidelines. Rebekah, as usual, had the balls to speak up first.

"Maybe you should send her away, Nick," she said, softly. "While she's like this, at least?"

Klaus didn't even have to move or respond. He just glared up at his sister and she quieted down.

"And if she did shut down her emotions because of Stefan Salvatore?" Elijah asked finally, "What then?"

Klaus glowered even more, if that were possible. "I am sure that this is all because of her mother."

"Humor the hypothetical, Klaus," Elijah pushed.

"Then hypothetically, while her humanity is turned on she has some absurd infatuation with Salvatore. When her humanity is off, she is more in-tune to her true desires, and she has sought out me," Klaus explained, angrily.

"What if it is not just infatuation, Klaus?" Elijah chanced.

"There is no hypothetical onto that possibility, brother!" Klaus spat out, rising in a rage again. "Now if you'll excuse me, I believe you have both outstayed your welcome. I know for fact that Hayley's pack is staging some sort of celebration tonight for tonight's full moon, perhaps I will find you all there."

He punctuated the speech with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"You always have been such a grateful man, Klaus," Rebekah said, cooly.

Elijah and Rebekah both looked at each other, unable and unwilling to hide their concern, but they stood and left anyway. When he heard the lock of the front door click behind them, he lowered his head into his hands wearily. After a few moments to collect himself, he rose and made his way to Caroline's room.

He put his ear to the door and jiggled the handle which was, of course, locked. She had music playing again, but very softly this time.

"Caroline…" he called out. But as soon as he said it, he realized something.

There had never been a set of speakers in that room, nor did Caroline have a computer with her. Her suitcase couldn't have even held one.

He didn't call again, he just braced himself and slammed his full weight on his shoulder against the door. It buckled and fell in immediately and his eyes scanned the room when he landed. There were a new set of speakers in the corner. When in God's name had she brought those in? They were softly playing music but Caroline was nowhere to be seen.

With no one home, Klaus didn't bother to smother his angry growl this time.

How many more fucking times am I going to have to break down doors for this woman? he wondered to himself and picked up his cell before speeding down the stairs.


If you'd asked Caroline, she'd say she wasn't even hiding from Klaus this time. He was mad at her, for no good reason, and Caroline hadn't been in the mood to deal with other people's emotions for days. She wasn't about to start managing hurt feelings any time soon. She needed to get out and hang out at a bar for awhile.

So, she'd popped a tape into the speaker system that she had stolen and left in her room after leaving Klaus at Cochon that morning. When she'd snuck her way into Atlanta, half vamp speeding it and half hitch-hiking with some drivers easily compelled to speed — not on a bus as she'd told Klaus — she'd stopped before hand to pick up some new essentials and dropped them off at his place. He hadn't even returned home yet when she'd dropped off the speakers and music, making her reprieve to Atlanta even easier, despite the fact that she'd always intended to come back.

Sure, Atlanta had the Coca-Cola museum and yes, she wanted to see it. Who didn't? But other than that, Atlanta had nothing on New Orleans to satiate her current selfish desires. Here it was, barely 7 o'clock and she wasn't the only one already drunk, not even close! She was surrounded by other drunks, many of them with deliciously discernible heartbeats! It was paradise.

She hadn't gotten to see the museum but, she was already fairly bored with the new city within half an hour of arriving. There were no crazy bars. And the humans didn't taste as sweet. After killing several humans — so boring, until she'd tried out a new technique to make the experience all the more horrific — she was practically just waiting for Klaus to find her.

And so she was again, giving him even less of a chase this time. It occurred to Caroline that she was basically just teasing herself. He'd already made it clear that he wasn't planning to sleep with her while she was behaving in such a volatile fashion. But, she considered, if he wasn't going to sleep with her… watching the Big Bad Original totally King Kong-out over her was the next best thing.

After discovering her room unoccupied, Klaus had immediately picked up his phone to dial Elijah and Marcel but, before he set foot out his front door, he caught her scent. She was close. She wasn't trying to hide.

She was less than a block from The Abattoir. He followed her trail to a non-descript bar around the block. It was mostly occupied by humans. She was doing tequila shots off of a young college-aged girl.

"Caroline," he growled lowly. With the music blasting in the bar, no one who didn't have vampire senses could have heard him. As such, Caroline was the only one to turn to him. The woman offering shots from her stomach was already up and moving on to another table.

"You bore!" she chastised. "You're only just getting here now?"

"It occurred to me that maybe you just like being hunted," he suggested coming up next to her at the bar and taking a swig of the beer she'd ordered for herself. "You do, don't you?"

"I'd like it a lot more if it resulted in me getting laid!" she threw right back at him.

He laughed at her. "I can take care of that, darling. Just turn your humanity back on."

"Do you really think I'm still going to want to have sex when I'm grieving over my dead mother?" she demanded.

"I've seen a lot of grief over the years, Caroline," he said, stepping towards her to cup the side of her face. "A natural source of endorphins is effective medicine."

She scoffed and stepped away from him and the bar. "Could that pick-up line be any less effective?" she asked.

Klaus took a different approach.

"I can understand why you turned it off, Caroline," he said. "I can understand why you left Virginia. It will be hard but the longer you keep your humanity turned off, the more pain you'll be in when you turn it back on. You're doing things I know you'll regret."

"So I'll never turn it back on! Easy!" she snapped, and walked past him into the opposite room of the bar where a few people were already sloppily dancing.

"If you really insist to keep this up, you at least have to stop running off," he said, following her. "You don't understand yet but you haven't arrived at the most convenient time-"

"Ohhhh, Klaus!" she exclaimed, pulling him to her on the dancefloor by the lapels, their bodies flush against one another. "Don't you get it? My humanity is off! I thought we'd been over that. I can leave you… whenever I want."

She finished the thought with a careless little shrug, still holding him close to her. Then she looked up to his eyes, placing two fingers on his chest.

"And don't. You. Forget. It!" she said in a bright baby-talk voice, punctuating each word with a mocking little jab to his chest. When she'd finished, she squirmed out away from him to dance alone but he caught her around the wrist and vamp sped her right back into his arms where he lead her into a real dance. He was so much quicker than she was. That's what 1,000 years experience gave you.

"Just what do you think you're doing, Caroline Forbes?" he asked her, one arm possessively wrapped around her. "Do you really think you're in control here?"

She laughed, loudly.

"Do you really think you are?" she asked. "Klaus, please. You won't even sleep with me because there's not enough… feeling, behind it. One of us is more easily able to manipulate here and, it ain't me because I don't have emotions to toy with."

Klaus sighed, his frustration evident. She wasn't wrong, but even without sleeping with her he'd found other ways to toy with her. He decided it was best not to voice that knowledge.

Caroline's attention was diverted and he looked over his shoulder to see her sizing up a group of young kids, he'd seen them around before. They lived in the city.

"Not them," Klaus said, holding her close when he felt her starting to pull away from him. "We don't feed on locals. Only tourists."

"What? Who says?"

"It's the one of the rules of the city, love. They keep things running smoothly for us here," he said.

Caroline huffed in annoyance before dragging him out of the bar, "I didn't come here because I thought there would be rules."

"Where are we going?" he asked with a laugh as she continued to haul him through the street.

"Bourbon street," she said. "You said tourists, I'm finding tourists."


Klaus made the trip quick. He'd compelled a young girl for Caroline and had her feed for just a minute before dragging her back to The Abattoir. They had a celebration to go to, the pack frequently held gatherings on nights with a full moon since Hayley's wedding and their curse was broken.

"Get dressed," he commanded. "The clothes we bought earlier are all in your room. We're going to a party."

"Finally," she'd responded, not caring a whit as to where they were actually headed that night. She slipped into a classic little black dress that she'd made him pick up before their lunch and met him downstairs.

"Hayley will be there tonight," he said when she appeared at his side. "My daughter, likely, will not. Either way, promise me that you'll behave."

Caroline wrinkled her nose. "I don't think I'm really capable of making promises right now," she said. "But if she behaves herself I won't really have a reason not to myself."

Besides hurting or humiliating her for personal enjoyment, Caroline thought to herself. But as frustrated as Klaus already was with her today, she didn't really feel the need to push him more. If a well-behaved Caroline was what he wanted, she'd play the role of her old self easily. Whatever it took to lure him into complacency and get herself laid.

Hayley lived with Klaus, normally, so Caroline wasn't sure whose house they were at. Klaus had simply said it was a party thrown by her pack. Tonight was a full moon and they didn't have to turn, thanks to some sacrifice Hayley had made. Caroline tuned out at that point of Klaus's explanation. She didn't care to know anything benevolent Hayley had done recently.

The party was on an old fashioned farm house far outside of The Quarter. It was rustic and reeked of southern charm. Twinkle lights hung from the mansion's porch and Caroline was sure her old self would have been fairly enchanted by the whole thing. Tucked into Klaus's side, she tried not to gag.

"So she's back," the she-wolf's voice rang out from behind them as soon as they had entered the party.

Caroline, on Klaus's arm, allowed herself to slowly be turned around to face Hayley.

"Hayley!" Caroline greeted in the most insidiously friendly voice she could muster and looking the wolf over. She was wearing a loose fitting brown dress with a heavy leather belt looped around her waist. "So you're still trying to rock that drab 'bohemian' look. Shame."

"So you're still trying to rock the spoiled debutant look," Hayley intoned, dryly.

Caroline offered her a hollow laugh but moved on. "I do apologize for Klaus. He should never had bothered your pack today. All I did was take a little day trip out of town!" she replied.

Then, she surprised the brunette by abruptly pulling her in and kissing her cheek exaggeratedly. Hayley sucked in a long breath, clearly agitated.

"But thank you," she said, laying it on as thick as possible. "I'm touched by your concern."

Caroline flushed with pleasure. This was fun.

"Just keep yourself in check while you're here," Hayley said, holding back her anger. Caroline could see in her eyes, she was pissed. "My pack had no plans to change tonight but that doesn't mean they won't. Stay away from me."

Caroline smirked wickedly but Klaus stepped in.

"Caroline, darling, why don't you find yourself a drink?" he asked.

Caroline wasn't normally one to be foisted off in the midst of a private conversation but she found that she couldn't care less about whatever placations Klaus was doubtless about to spew to the mother of his child. With an annoyed smile, she disconnected herself from, Klaus and turned in search of better fun. Besides, provoking Hayley into violence with her entire pack their to back her definitely wouldn't be the smartest idea. She hadn't needed Klaus's blood to heal her in New Orleans yet and she hoped to keep it that way.

Klaus watched after Caroline for a moment, both to see that she was making her towards the bar and to locate other eyes at the party keeping watch. Rebekah was in the far corner and her eyes were locked on Caroline's form. Good girl, he thought before turning back to Hayley, who was still overlooking her celebration and her pack. Her brows had deep frown lines etched into them. She was very concerned.

"Penny for your thoughts," Klaus said.

Hayley sighed. "You know what my thoughts are." She was agitated.

"Caroline's humanity is off," he said. "She doesn't care any more for past petty feuds."

"Right, past petty feuds are just a source of amusement for her now," Hayley responded. "Which explains why she attacked me."

Klaus sighed. "She won't do that again," he promised, unsure of how true that statement actually was. "And she would never do anything to Hope."

Hayley looked up at him, shaking her head.

"You have a lot more confidence than I do, Klaus," she said. "If you're really planning to keep her here… make her turn her humanity back on. She's dangerous without it, Klaus, I can sense it."

He swallowed hard. "I'm working on it."

Hayley's eyes were still on Caroline who, now with drink in hand, was starting up a conga line on the dance floor in the courtyard outside the house. "I trust you, Klaus. I just don't trust her."

They both stood quietly side by side for a moment. Klaus snagged a glass of champagne from the passing trey of a caterer and turned to her again.

"How is our daughter?" he asked.

Hayley smiled. "Sweet as always," she said. "Jackson and several other members of the pack are with her tonight. We're not exactly advertizing that we're not living with you any more and it never hurts to be careful."

"Good," he said. "I agree. This won't be forever, you'll be back home soon."

Hayley shrugged like she didn't really believe him and walked away to talk to a guest across the room. Klaus noticed Elijah watching her from the sides of the party. Suddenly, Rebekah stepped up where Hayley had just been.

"Enjoying the party?" he asked.

"No." Rebekah snorted. "If it weren't for that girl you're playing house with, I'd be at home trying to figure out how to bring Kol back and get into my own body."

"I'm not sure I'd define what I'm doing as playing house," he said but Rebekah stared coldly back at him. She wasn't in the mood for games. "Well, get on with it then. I think she's fine for the evening."

Rebekah checked over her shoulder looking at the bored blonde sitting on the couch sucking at a cocktail through a straw.

"You'd better get over there," she advised. "She's bored and that can't be good. I'll see you later."

Klaus waved her off and turned to redirect his attention to Caroline. She looked like the calm before a storm. He'd be better off getting her out of here.

They'd made their appearance at the party long enough to make sure that Haley's pack, as well as Marcel and his siblings, saw that Caroline was under control, at least for the time being.


After stopping several times to compel tourist to feed from — Caroline's renewed bloodlust was insatiable, apparently — he'd finally taken her back to The Abattoir. He'd immediately settled into his couch, simply thankful that Caroline had kept her promise to keep the peace for that evening.

"Heeeeeere's Johnny!"

Caroline's head appeared from around the doorframe. In her hands she held a DVD copy of The Shining.

"I had a feeling you guys would have it. I passed by Elijah's extensive film collection yesterday day on my way up to bed," she said and made her way over to the television with the film before plopping down on the sofa next to him, the empty movie case in one hand and a bottle of Johnny Walker in the other. He frowned. They had much nicer liquor than that but he supposed this created some sort of mood for her.

"I had no idea you were such a film fanatic," he stated simply.

She curled herself into his relaxed frame without asking. "Oh, yeah! I adore Kubrick and Scorsese," she said. He found himself wrapping around her without question, because it seemed the most right feeling in the world. "Or anything with Jack Nicholson. Or Meryl Streep. Ya' know, all the good stuff."

"All the good stuff?" he asked as the movie began to flash on the big screen in front of them. "What about Bogart?"

"Don't get me wrong, I love the classics too," she said. "But earlier I was basically bathing in blood in a hotel. The Shining seemed only fitting for tonight."

He didn't begrudge her. She was entranced by the film, knew much of it by heart. He wondered how many times she seen it. It was so oddly fitting… that this young, gloriously beautiful vampire would have such an innate love for this type of film. He couldn't believe she'd actually settled down enough to watch it and he definitely felt a vague sense of unease that she was working some angle that he just hadn't discovered yet. But with her tucked into him, he was willing to overlook his suspicions for the time being.

The scene where Jack Nicholson's character entered room 237 came up. Caroline was perfectly still, clearly invested in the movie with every shred of her consciousness. They were almost to the part where the naked woman emerged from the bathtub now… Caroline was leaning in closer to the television. The music was growing louder.

"Ahhh!" Klaus screamed, very suddenly, into her ear while gripping her tightly out of the blue.

Caroline returned his scream in kind, but hers was genuine. She was looking up at him with bright, unblinking, fearful eyes until she spontaneously dissolved into a fit of giggles.

"Oh you jerk!" she seethed, still laughing. "God damn, that was good. Congratulations where they're due. I can't believe I didn't see that coming."

Klaus was laughing with her but he'd picked up the remote to pause the film. The scene they were on wasn't exactly ideal for romantic interludes.

He looked down at her in his arms and she grinned back up at him.

"Klaus Mikaelson, are you trying to put the moves on me?" she asked. "During a horror movie? How cliche!"

She was teasing, he could see it in her eyes but, in the same glance, he could still see her distance as well. As much as he wanted her, he didn't want to delude himself while she had her humanity turned off. Eventually, she'd turn it back on. And if he'd let himself get too involved with her before that happened, their parting would only be more painful when she did.

"It's late, Caroline. I have plans to see my daughter early tomorrow. I have to be getting to bed," he said, removing her from his arms and laying her soundly on the couch.

"Ugh," she cried out in frustration. "Klaus, you really are the worst host ever."

"Only because I won't sleep with you while you aren't yourself?" he called out from the bottom of the stairs. "I'd say that makes me an exceedingly gallant host. Enjoy your movie!"

Caroline groaned again before huffing and putting the movie back on play.


I always try to stay as cannon and in-character as possible but I can't resist a little fluff in this pairing… even if Caroline happens to be a conniving bitch right now.

SaiyukiLover232 hope this chapter clears up any concerns you may have had. Just wanted to let you know I am basically on the same page as you and have no plans to keep the family permanently split up! That in no way seems in-character to me, either.

Thanks to everyone else for their messages, questions, follows, and favs! If I didn't answer you personally it's because the answer to your question is a simple: wait and see! ;)

Still not an M, yet, I know. Turns out all the teasing is fun to write on its own. Plus, it seems the plot I have brewing just isn't quite there yet. But thoughts on pacing or anything else are always welcome!