Nick was pulled from a deep sleep at eight the following morning by what his sleep-addled brain interpreted as the tinkling of a music box. "Mmm," he mumbled, turning over and reaching out for his partner, "Just five more minutes, Monroe."
To Nick's surprise, he did not come in contact with the blutbad's warm body, only the tangle of cool sheets. When his eyes flew open, they corroborated what his other senses had already told him: Monroe was gone.
"Monroe?" he shouted, glancing frantically around the room before hurling himself off the bed, "Monroe?" By the time Nick had searched the entire suite and found not only Monroe, but also Henry missing, a thousand terrible possibilities had flashed through his mind, all scored to the mechanical music of the strange, still jingling contraption.
What if Dorothy Vogel found out they were harboring Henry and taken them both? What if Mrs. Sims was a Ziegevolk and ensnared him with her charms? What if -
Nick was interrupted in his stream of worrying by a knock at the door. In a matter of seconds, he had grabbed his Glock 9mm from the desk drawer he had stashed it in the night before and was occupying textbook defensive position next to the door.
After taking a deep breath in and and then out to steady his nerves, Nick flung open the door, brandishing the Glock, and shouted, "Freeze, hands in the air!" to a very surprised looking Monroe, who was clearly debating whether following Nick's instructions or not dropping a cup of piping hot coffee on himself was more important.
"Geez, Nick!" he exclaimed, evidently deciding to prioritize not getting scalded, "Is that how you always answer the door, or am I just lucky?"
"Monroe!" Nick exclaimed, his tone a mix of relief and irritation, "Where the hell have you been?"
"Would you mind putting the gun down, first?" Monroe asked, eyeing it suspiciously. "Blutbaden and firearms have never mixed terribly well."
"Right, er, sorry," Nick said, sheepishly tucking the pistol into the waistband of his sweatpants and stepping back inside.
"And put that somewhere safer," Monroe said, reaching for the butt of the gun with his free hand, "I am not explaining to some emergency room intern how you managed to get shot there."
Nick would surely have given a proper retort, had he not been distracted how near Monroe's hand was to actually being in his pants. Monroe, too, seemed to sense the unexpected consequences of his gesture - he swiftly removed the gun and placed it on the bedside table with a mumbled, "Idiot," before turning his attention to silencing the still chiming contraption.
"Don't try to change the subject," Nick said, though that certainly was what he himself was doing now, "Where were you this morning?"
"You're the hotshot detective," Monroe challenged, handing Nick the cup of coffee, "You figure it out."
"You made me coffee?" Nick asked, strangely pleased.
"Mmm, great start," Monroe said sarcastically, "Really, fantastic detecting. They should make you the chief of police!"
"Oh, shut up," Nick said, grabbing a pillow off the bed to hurl at Monroe. As he watched Monroe catch the pillow and handily hurl one back, Nick noticed the thin sheen of sweat giving his face and arms a healthy glow, and everything fell into place.
"Pilates!" Nick exclaimed triumphantly, depositing the coffee on the desk, "Ha! You do it every morning!"
"There you go, Sherlock," Monroe said, smiling patronizingly at him, "I knew you'd get there in the end."
"Wait," Nick said, suddenly anxious again, "Where's Henry? Is he okay?"
"Relax," Monroe said, placing his hands on Nick's shoulders in a calming gesture, "He's downstairs helping Mrs. Sims with the breakfast. Apparently the little guy loves to cook, but that harpie of a wife never lets him."
"I'm glad that he's all right," Nick said with a sigh of relief. I'm glad that you're all right, he left unsaid.
The look on his face must have made it pretty clear, though, because the next thing Monroe said was, "You were worried." His tone was matter-of-fact and was accompanied by a curious look in his eye.
"Well, with all these creatures running about the place," Nick said, trying unsuccessfully for nonchalance, "Maybe a little..."
Nick had expected Monroe to tease him, as he had the previous day, or at the very least to yell at him for what he realized now was a serious overreaction, but Monroe did neither. Instead, he fixed Nick with that intense gaze he normally reserved for his clock-making projects, and said softly, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you."
It was at this point that Nick became very aware of his own bare shoulders and the fact that Monroe's hands were still keeping them warm.
"No harm done," Nick said softly, hoping to God the warmth he felt spreading over his torso wasn't manifesting itself in a blush.
"Well...good," Monroe said after a minute, clapping him awkwardly on the shoulder. "You, um, finish that coffee - I'm gonna hop in the shower."
Monroe pivoted toward the bathroom and stripped off his shirt, causing Nick to mumble, "Yeah, sure," and focus rather more attention than strictly necessary on transferring the coffee from the mug into his mouth.
Nick dressed quickly, hoping to avoid any further awkwardness, and by the time Monroe emerged from the bathroom 30 minutes later, he was sitting at the desk, poring over the volumes of Grimm lore.
"Working already?" Monroe asked with a little smile.
"You know what they say about the early bird..." Nick replied, though he shut the book.
"Yeah, you should eat him first," Monroe said, is if were obvious. Upon seeing the baffled look on Nick's face, he explained a bit sheepishly, "Blutbad proverbs tend to differ from human ones in...certain respects."
"I'm not even going to ask how you think the one about skinning a cat goes," Nick said with a shudder.
"Probably best," Monroe concurred with a dark smile.
This discussion was interrupted by a sudden, albeit soft knock at the door, prompting Nick and Monroe to shout "Come in, Henry!" in near perfect unison.
"So sorry to bother you again," the little man said, opening the door slowly, as if he was afraid his welcome might be retracted at any moment. "It's just...breakfast...I made...French toast..."
"Thank you, Henry," Nick said, making sure to smile, "That sounds wonderful. I can't wait to taste it."
"Oh good!" Henry exclaimed, clasping his hands together with such unbridled joy that it couldn't help but warm Nick's heart. "It's the very least I can do. You two have been...so kind."
"Think nothing of it," Monroe insisted, ushering him toward the door. "Now, you go on down and start dishing out that French toast, Henry, we'll be right there."
"You know, I think that's the first time I've ever seen him really smile," Monroe said incredulously, shutting the door behind Henry.
"Well, I'm hoping it will be a much more frequent occurrence if we can get him away from that wife of his," Nick said dryly.
"Oh, well, no problem, then," Monroe said sarcastically, "All we have to do is separate a Falkefrau from her primary source of sustenance. Piece of cake."
"You, my friend," Nick said, crossing the room to hold the door open for Monroe, "could really benefit from an optimistic attitude."
"Oh, I could, huh?" Monroe asked, sliding past him into the hallway. "So you actually think if I suddenly start about how singing how the sun will come out tomorrow, everything will just magically work itself out?"
"Maybe not," Nick said with a sly grin, "But it would certainly make my day."
Nick laughed and jogged into the breakfast room before Monroe could retaliate, calling out with a cheerful, "Good morning, all!"
"Morning, Nick!" Annie said, handing him a glass of orange juice. "Morning, Monroe! I trust you two slept well."
"Not too well, if you know what I mean," Monroe said, slinging an arm around Nick's shoulders and throwing him an exaggerated wink.
"Oh, Monroe, you are so bad!" Annie exclaimed with a giggle, before her husband's obvious confusion over how to slice a pineapple drew her attention away.
"Oh, I am going to kill you," Nick whispered, though there was no bite in his voice.
"Revenge is sweet, my friend," Monroe said with a wicked grin, "Mmm, and so are those pastries, by the looks of it. I'm going to have to do a high-burn routine tomorrow, but I don't care - cherry Danish are my weakness."
"I'm going to remember that," Nick called after Monroe as the blutbad made his way to the buffet table. Nick was about to join him when he caught Mrs. Sims' gaze from across the room, and not for the first time that weekend, got the strange sensation that she could read his mind.
After filing the feeling away for later contemplation, he fixed himself a heaping plate of breakfast - making sure to take three pieces of French toast from a beaming Henry - and sat down between Monroe and a slender, blonde woman whom he recognized from the jam making session the previous night.
"I would love to do a bit of exploring in the woods around the house," the woman was saying to Monroe and Annie. "They look just magical. Who knows what we might find?"
"Perhaps a house made of candy," Annie said teasingly, thankfully not noticing the forced nature of Monroe's responding laughter or the look he exchanged with Nick.
"Yes, well," Nick said, trying to shift the focus away from fairy tales, just in case, "I could definitely go for a walk in the woods." Remembering Monroe's previous comment to Annie and deciding two could play at that game, he slid his hand over Monroe's and asked, "What about you, honey?"
"Oh, absolutely, sweetie," Monroe said, not missing a beat, "You know how I enjoy channeling my inner wild man."
Nick sent him a look that said, Please, please, please do not turn that into a sex joke, which was apparently pathetic enough for Monroe to restrain himself and change the subject.
"Marisa," he said, turning to the blonde woman, "Have you met my partner, Nick?"
"I don't think I've had the pleasure," she said, turning toward him with an outstretched hand, which he shook. "Nice to meet you, Nick. Gosh, Monroe's just been telling us so much about you, I almost feel like we know each other already."
"He does love to brag on me," Nick said, sending Monroe a sickeningly sweet look of pure affection, "but I'm afraid that puts me at a loss. You must tell me something about yourself so I'm caught up."
"Well," she said, considering, "I'm afraid I'm the only single woman in the place...although Mr. Sims does seem to be out of the picture, so perhaps that isn't strictly true."
"Oh, but your partner from the other night..." Nick said, gesturing to where the man he had assumed to be her husband was complimenting Henry on his French toast, "I just assumed you were together."
"Ethan?" she asked with a laugh. "Oh no - he plays for your team, I'm afraid. Ethan's just here to keep me company, and for moral support. My husband and I used to come here all the time before...well, before he passed away three years ago. Car accident. I'd been thinking lately that it's about time for a new start, and for some reason this seemed just the place to get one."
"Well, I think that's a wonderful idea," Monroe said firmly, patting her hand encouragingly.
"Yes," Annie agreed, "just wonderful. And a walk in the woods sounds like a marvelous idea to me. We should all go - make a day of it!"
"David, darling!" she called out to her husband, who seemed to have finally mastered the pineapple and was moving on to a mango.
"Yeah, Annie?" he shouted back, not taking his eyes from the fruit in front of him.
"Would you be a dear and ask Mrs. Sims if it's all right for us to go roaming around the woods today? And perhaps if she would be so kind as to pack a few picnic lunches?"
"Be glad to," David replied, "In just...one...ha! Got it! I'll go and ask her now."
"That man does come in handy now and again," Annie said, gazing fondly at her husband, "even if he is more than a tad accident prone."
"Hey, I just realized," she said, glancing around the room suddenly, "the dragon lady never came down this morning!"
"I wouldn't say dragon," Nick corrected automatically, "I mean more of a bird of - er, that's a, um, good point, Annie. I wonder where she is."
"Probably sulking in that terrifying room of theirs," Monroe said in between tearing into the sausages on his plate.
"I feel so bad for that poor husband of hers," Marisa said, lowering her voice, "he seems such a sweet, little man."
"What I don't get is how they ever got together in the first place," Annie said thoughtfully, plunging a spoon into a grapefruit hemisphere, "I mean, they can't have ever had much chemistry."
"Not like you two, certainly," Marisa said, glancing between Nick and Monroe with a shy smile. "All that lovely give and take."
"Careful, Marisa," Monroe said, sending a thoroughly appraising look Nick's way, "I think my partner might just be blushing."
"Oh, I am not," Nick scoffed, hoping desperately that Monroe's comment was not in reference to what had happened earlier in the room.
"Hush now, you two, here comes Mrs. Sims," Annie said with a mischievous smile, acting as if they were about to get caught smoking behind the gym.
"Annie, dear," Mrs. Sims said sweetly, though there was a definite edge to her tone, "David tells me that you want to spend the day tromping around my dilapidated, old forest."
"Oh, it's not dilapidated at all, Mrs. Sims," Annie insisted, "quite the opposite, in fact. It's all just beautiful and wild."
"Mmm, yes," Mrs. Sims said with a frown, "wild is exactly what I'm afraid of. Do you know what kinds of feral creatures live in those woods, Annie? I wouldn't like to think of the lot of you tromping out there, unprotected."
"Where's your adventurous spirit, Mrs. Sims?" Annie demanded, unfazed. "I mean, what would life be without a bit of danger now and again? Look, if you're worried about the potential liability for the Enchanted Rose, you needn't be. Once we're fifty yards past the house, we are no longer your responsibility."
"I take it that means I will be unable to dissuade you of this silly notion?" Mrs. Sims inquired, crossing her arms disapprovingly.
"I'm afraid so," Annie said, flashing her a winning smile. She got to her feet in a rush and placed a kiss on the cheek of their very surprised looking landlady and said, "But you shouldn't worry; it'll all go splendidly, I promise you. Now, are you allowed to furnish us with lunches, or would that count as enabling?"
"If you are so dead set on proceeding with this silly venture, you shall not be doing it on empty stomachs," Mrs. Sims said firmly. "I'll just go and put something together."
"You're an old softie, you know that, Mrs. Sims?" Annie called after her, grinning. "Well," she said, turning back to the rest of the party, "If we are going to be traipsing through the woods all day, I suppose a pencil skirt is not going to cut it. So if you gentlemen and lady will excuse me, I'll just pop up to my room and change."
"Oh, that's a good idea," Marisa said, glancing over her sweater set with some dismay, "I think I will as well."
As soon as the ladies had departed from the table, Nick leaned forward and whispered to Monroe, "Did you hear that?"
"Yes," Monroe whispered back, "But I think what you're wearing is fine."
"Not that," Nick replied with an impatient wave, "I mean about the woods. Mrs. Sims obviously didn't want us looking around too much."
"What, you think that means she has a stash of bodies out there?" Monroe asked doubtfully.
"Maybe!" Nick insisted, "Or a secret laboratory or...oh, I don't know, something sinister!"
"And because you're convinced that these woods must contain something either damning or dangerous, you are now completely determined to comb every inch of them, is that it?" Monroe asked skeptically.
"Yes," Nick assented with a firm nod, failing to notice Monroe's implicit criticism of his logic. "I will find out what's been going on at this inn if it kills me."
"That," Monroe said, looking at him in deadly earnest, "is exactly what I'm afraid of."
Before Nick had a chance to respond or ponder that too closely, his attention, and that of most of the other occupants of the room, was drawn to the doorway - specifically to Dorothy Vogel, standing next to the buffet table and looking thoroughly incensed.
"Looks like our luck didn't hold out," Monroe murmured.
Nick instinctively shifted his glance toward Henry, who was cowering under his wife's gaze and making an ineffective effort to hide behind a plaster column. Nick started to rise, intending to intervene if it became necessary, but a strong hand on his arm soon stopped him.
"Hey," Monroe whispered, gesturing to the other side of the room, "I think she's got it covered."
When Nick shifted his gaze to where Monroe was pointing, he saw that Mrs. Sims did, indeed, have it covered. Before Dorothy Vogel could get within three feet of Henry, Mrs. Sims had placed a firm hand on her shoulder and gestured her politely, but resolutely toward one of the tables.
"How does she do that?" Monroe exclaimed in amazement.
"I don't know," Nick said quietly, "but if the answer is anywhere in those woods, I am sure as hell going to find out."
"Come on, you two," Annie exclaimed, bursting back into the room, now clad in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt with "Wellesley, Class of 2001" stamped on the front in faded, blue lettering. "Mrs. Sims has packed us the most wonderful picnic lunch. Now, let's go have that adventure!"
"Is Marisa ready?" Monroe asked, rising from the breakfast table to follow Annie toward the lobby.
"Oh, yes," she said impatiently, tugging Nick out of his chair. "Honestly, I don't know why you boys are always moaning about how long it takes us girls to get ready. We can be perfectly swift when the occasion calls."
"I would never dream of saying otherwise," Nick assured her, hands raised in supplication. "Now, this one on the other hand..." he added mischievously, running a hand down Monroe's shoulder.
"Hey!" Monroe protested, swinging his arm around Nick's head in a playful headlock and ruffling his hair, "I am not the one who treats his hair like a mix between a priceless artifact and a delicate work of art."
"Which you are now destroying!" Nick protested, ducking out of Monroe's grip with no little effort.
Annie let out a musical laugh at the way Nick began to smooth down his black locks while glaring half-heartedly at Monroe before she called out, "Fancy a stroll, Henry?"
"Oh, t-thank you," Henry began, sneaking a finger under his collar and loosening it nervously, "So k-kind, but I think I'll s-stay and help Mrs. S-Sims c-clean up."
"What about you, Dorothy?" Annie asked, distinctly less enthusiastically.
"Good heavens, no," Dorothy said, her voice dripping with disdain, "Nothing so wretched as a day spent in...Nature. I shall be in that hole in the wall she calls a room, counting down the moments until we can't depart from this godforsaken place."
"Well, then," Annie said, clasping her hands together awkwardly, "I guess it's just the five of us." She began to scan the room for her husband, calling out, "Come on, David!" when she spotted him, prompting David to come jogging over to join their little party.
"Six, actually," Marisa corrected, when the four of them had made their departure into the lobby, "I'm not about to let Ethan spend the day using up all our hot water having a soak."
"Now, that's not fair, Mari!" the man she had told them was Ethan interjected, rolling his eyes and giving Marisa a teasing, little shove. "That was only the once, and it was a jacuzzi with double jets! How was I supposed to resist?"
"I know I can never resist a hot tub myself," Monroe offered helpfully, "Just something about the bubbles."
"Monroe, I can't remember, have you met Ethan?" Marisa asked pleasantly, looking between them.
"Oh, I'm sure I would have remembered becoming acquainted with a man such as yourself," Ethan said flirtatiously, extending a hand to Monroe. "Ethan Anderson, Newsweek."
"Eddie Monroe," Monroe replied, accepting the offered hand in a slightly hesitant handshake, "Er...freelance. Oh, and this is..." he began, turning to Nick, who promptly interrupted him.
"Nick Burkhardt," he said, offering Ethan one hand as he entwined the other around Monroe's torso in a gesture that clearly said, Mine. Why he felt such a strong need to do this when Monroe was not, strictly speaking, his was something Nick was determined not to think about.
"Just my luck," Ethan said with an exaggerated sigh, accepting Nick's hand, "Both taken. I trust this means we can be friends, then?"
"I very seldom say no to new friends," Nick assured him with a smile, as a strange little voice in his head whispered something to the effect of potential threat neutralized.
"You'll have to excuse my partner," Monroe said, winding an arm around Nick's waist in an echo of the other's earlier gesture, "He gets a tad...territorial at times."
"And you will have to excuse Ethan," Marisa said with a laugh as she looped an arm affectionately through his, "He flirts with absolutely anything in pants. At one particularly memorable state dinner, after a bad breakup and four whiskey sours, he even asked Hilary Clinton back to his place."
"It was Madeleine Albright," Ethan corrected primly. "And what can I say, she has this earthy, masculine energy that I apparently respond very well to when I'm intoxicated."
"Ah, but did she say yes?" Nick asked teasingly.
"That, my friend," Ethan said with an admonishing gesture of his finger, "is a matter far above your security clearance."
This received a hearty chuckle from the group and an accusation of his being "downright naughty" from Annie before the six of them headed out the door.
"So," Monroe whispered to Nick, making sure the two of them lagged a little behind the others, "What's the plan?"
"First, we should contrive to split with the group as soon as possible," Nick whispered back, "Make it seem like we want some...couple time."
"Shouldn't be too difficult..." Monroe muttered, his voice so low it was barely audible.
"What?" Nick asked, not entirely sure he had heard correctly.
"Then what?" Monroe said instead.
"Then," Nick continued, glossing for the moment over why Monroe had chosen to alter his response, "we use your heightened senses and my police skills to find out just what Mrs. Sims is hiding in these woods."
"Well," Monroe observed, looking around them with obvious apprehension, "Then I guess it's into the woods we must go.
