a/n: This is the chapter quite a few of you have been waiting for, it marks a change in not only Nick and Adalind's relationship but in the tone of the story. I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the chapter.
For thinktink2 – I made you wait those 3 chapters.
Necessary Sins – Chapter 10
He was not okay.
Sitting beside Adalind on the bathroom floor and holding her hair, everything had seemed so simple. Hadn't he and Juliette broken up because she wasn't willing to risk children when being a Grimm made his life dangerous? Wasn't Adalind handing him the very thing he wanted? So he should be happy, right? He should be happy that some part of the future he'd always hoped for was coming to pass.
Only, he'd always thought that future would be with Juliette and all of the what ifs and wondering about how things might have been if he and Adalind had met under different circumstances didn't automatically mean everything would be okay. They weren't together, they weren't prepared for this and they were both still being hunted by the Royal families and a number of other wesen looking for revenge, the keys, more revenge – it wasn't exactly the ideal time to bring a baby into the world.
He hated that this made him see things from Juliette's perspective, he hated that he understood where she was coming from now that he was faced with the fears of keeping a child safe in his world. He hated that suddenly he was doubting his decision to break up with her, wondering if they could have made it work anyway.
He hated that he was even entertaining those thoughts when there was another part of him that was genuinely pleased with what had happened. Adalind wasn't exactly the first person he'd choose to have a child with but these days she wasn't the last either. They'd managed to build a friendship in just a short few months even after years of hating each other and fighting for the upper hand. If their constant battle of wills was anything to go by (and how they'd turned that around) then there was no reason they shouldn't be able to work together to raise a child. They could be one of those co-parenting teams, right?
He wasn't sure it was possible, but he got the feeling he'd been thinking so loud it had woken Adalind because she rolled over and squinted at him through the pale sunlight that was managing to streak through the dirty exterior of the windows. 'You're up early.'
He made some sort of grunt in response that didn't really do anything more than cause her to frown at him with sudden suspicion. He thought about lying to her, about pushing it off as something to do with work but in the years he'd known Adalind he'd rarely lied to her. Tricked and deceived, sure, but that was just par for the course when he was trying to outsmart her in whatever game they were playing. He'd never outright lied to her, though, not that he could remember, and he certainly hadn't since they'd started becoming friends. Which was a weird enough realisation to have all on its own.
Whatever happened now, they would always be tied together by their child. Whether or not she moved out or he did, whether or not they met other people, this baby would always keep them together and the thought was calming, it put things in perspective and so instead of brushing off the tumult of thoughts churning inside him, he shared them with her.
'I've become very aware of the number of people who want us dead.'
'Ah,' Adalind said, understanding dawning. 'I've already had this freak out.'
Nick turned to look at her. 'What?'
Adalind nodded. 'When I first realised I was pregnant I panicked about all of the things that could go wrong, all of the people who want to kill me, all of the people I've wronged or who just want answers from me. It doesn't exactly seem like the best time to bring another child into the world when I couldn't even keep Diana.'
'What changed your mind?' He rolled onto his side now so that he was mirroring her position.
'You did,' she told him. 'I thought about terminating but that lasted about two seconds and I thought about just running away – that thought lasted about as long – but you were here. I don't know what this is between us, whether you can call it a friendship or something else, but whatever it is its ours and this child is too. Yes, the timing isn't exactly ideal, but you're a Grimm and I'm a hexenbiest and we can be pretty scary on our own but together? Nick, I think you and I could take on the world.'
Nick stared at her for a long moment, mulling over her words and realising he'd needed to hear them. They were the things he wanted to hear because he did want this baby and it didn't matter that it had happened during a spell or that it was on the heels of his break up with Juliette because Adalind was right, they could do this.
'I kind of want to kiss you right now.'
Adalind grinned. 'That's the relief talking.'
'You're probably right,' the response was automatic, the deflection rolled off his tongue without thought but after he'd said them he wondered if they were true. It wasn't something he was prepared to think about just then, they had way bigger things to deal with than his (not so) fleeting desire to kiss her. He smiled ruefully at her. 'Thanks.'
She shrugged again, pushing herself up and making general motions that as they were awake she might as well get started on the day. 'Happy to help. I assure you, at some point, you'll have to remind me of all of that.'
He laughed.
'Oh, I'm perfectly serious. Do you realise how hard it's been keeping this from you? I'm like an emotional yo-yo, one minute everything is fine and I'm excited to be a mom again and the next I'm paranoid and seeing wesen assassins around every corner.'
Nick stopped laughing abruptly. He sat up sharply and reached for her hand, gripping it tightly in his own. 'I didn't need that thought.' Then after a moment of further (terrified) consideration (he didn't know if he was feeling that for Adalind or the baby or both) he asked, 'Have there been more wesen assassins?'
'Ha!' she cried, apparently amused by his own yo-yo of emotion. 'Now you know how I feel.' But she squeezed his hand reassuringly before she pulled free. 'Let's go out for breakfast since we didn't get to do dinner last night.'
'Why do I feel like that invitation has less to do with my company and more to do with the contents of our fridge?'
Adalind grinned. 'Because neither of us have been to the store and you're actually kind of smart no matter what people say.'
He thought he might have just been insulted but he let it slide. Much like he ignored the niggling concern in the back of his mind all weekend that he and Adalind were very much an old married couple for two people who weren't even together.
It started at breakfast. They went to a café they'd started frequenting when they were carpooling and despite the chill in the air, the sun was warm and so they took a table outside (though still close to the patio heater). Adalind liked to people watch and he had to admit it was a fun way to pass the time with her because it pitted his observational skills as a detective against her general knowledge of people. After all, you had to be able to read people to manipulate them affectively.
'No,' she told him with a laugh. 'That's definitely a walk of shame. No woman would ever wear those shoes and that dress at this time of day.'
Nick shook his head. 'That's a wedding ring she's wearing,' he pointed out. 'Girls night, she's crawling home with a hangover hoping like hell her husband's already sorted the kids out.'
'What makes you think she has kids?'
'She's what? Thirty-five? She's unsteady in those heels and it has nothing to do with being hungover. I'm telling you, she's used to running around after kids and wearing sneakers.'
Adalind scoffed but as neither of them were about to go up and ask the woman they left it at that. After they'd swapped their attention to talking about Monroe and Rosalee's latest threat (a fox killed and left to hang outside the Spice Shop's back door), the waitress Tamsin (who was familiar enough with their orders that she brought them a coffee and tea without having to ask), stopped by to get their breakfast order. The café was a little quiet given the early hour on a Saturday and so Adalind relished the chance to talk with someone outside of her work.
Nick learned more in two minutes listening to Adalind and Tamsin talk than he ever really needed to know about the woman's life. That didn't mean he didn't express his own best wishes when she nervously explained how she was soon going to have to defend her dissertation, it was just weird realising again how perfectly normal Adalind was when he wasn't seeing only the vicious hexenbiest attempting to kill him.
He figured that went both ways. If he was seeing Adalind in a whole new light he could only imagine she was seeing the same in him – well he hoped she was. He knew how hard it was for wesen to believe he wasn't like other Grimms, that he didn't have a shoot first ask questions later policy. Or a kill first, bury the body later philosophy as most wesen expected of him. He liked to think that this whole thing was just as weird and disconcerting for her as well.
It was just that she'd been brave enough to reach out to her enemy when things got bad. It took a lot of strength and determination to take that kind of risk, to place your life in the hands of someone you'd tried to kill and only recently tricked into losing their powers. That was Adalind, though. He had to respect that, respect her, he didn't know if he'd have been able to make that choice had the situation been reversed.
He was glad she'd made that choice though; he was finding that being friends with Adalind was actually kind of enjoyable. He liked the woman she was without all the vengeance and death threats. He hoped she liked the man she saw now that he was no longer trying to kill her. He wondered if he should invite Rosalee and Monroe over so they could get to know her as he had done. She was going to be a huge part of his life now and he thought it might be a good idea to start rebuilding the trust they had broken when they stole Diana from her if he was ever going to be able to help the two parts of his life become one.
He thought he'd leave the whole pregnancy thing out of it for now. He just didn't think that would give the right impression. He didn't want anyone making assumptions about his reasons for spending time with Adalind. He wanted his friends to see the Adalind he now knew, not the vindictive witch they'd last dealt with.
And he wasn't going to analyse the why of that just yet.
Besides, wasn't there a specific number of months you were supposed to wait before you told people you were expecting a baby? He'd have to ask Adalind, he really knew nothing about babies. He probably should start correcting that soon. He figured he'd need the next six (or was it five now?) months to learn all he could.
After breakfast Adalind dragged him through six different furniture stores looking for a small table she wanted to put beside the elevator, 'You know, for keys and things.'
Shopping for furniture while battling Christmas crowds was not particularly pleasant but he couldn't exactly judge Adalind for wanting to make the loft homier. They hadn't really talked about their living arrangements, just sort of fallen into living together without any real fuss. Sharing one bathroom had been a bit of a struggle those first few days but now they were used to it. Whether or not they'd intended it to happen, the loft was theirs more so than it had ever just been Nick's safe house or Adalind's refuge and so he didn't begrudge her the table or the stools she decided would be perfect at the bench in the open kitchen.
He drew the line at the rug, though, which she considered fair when he pointed out they had no way of getting it home and they weren't about to have it delivered and compromise the loft's location.
'I think there's a smaller one in storage with my mother's things,' she'd said thoughtfully which was how they went from furniture shopping on Saturday to clearing out her storage locker on Sunday.
'Do you think we should move some of this stuff to the trailer?' he asked, looking around at some of the creepier items she had stored away. He picked up what looked like an honest-to-God witch's hat and raised a brow in amusement.
Adalind eyed the hat warily. 'I used that when I changed myself into Juliette. I think this stuff is too powerful to leave in a trailer in the woods – no offense.'
Nick wasn't offended, the stuff he had in his trailer was too valuable to leave lying about unprotected. He wasn't entirely sure the piece of land in the woods was any better than the storage yard had been. He was relying on people not knowing where to look to keep it safe. He didn't have any security on it or any way of preventing people from breaking in and taking things. Something he should probably rectify now that Adalind had made him aware of it.
'Most of this can probably go,' Adalind admitted. 'The hexenbiest stuff we can take back to the loft, it's only really a couple of boxes and they're not the kind of things we should just leave lying around.'
What she wanted to keep fitted into six boxes and they easily fit into the back of Nick's Land Cruiser. The rug took some negotiating but it wasn't nearly as big as the one she'd been eyeing in the store and eventually they managed to get it in on top of the boxes and balanced over the top of the backseats and through to the front.
They hit the grocery store on the way home, conceding that they couldn't keep eating all of their meals out.
The whole weekend passed in a blur and it wasn't really until Monday when he was back at work that it occurred to him how, to an outsider, he and Adalind looked (and frankly acted) like a couple.
They'd argued over furniture (and, at one point, paint colours), they'd written a grocery list and planned the week's meals and they'd talked about her work and his, about Monroe and Rosalee's continuing problems with the wesenrein and sat around the loft in comfortable silence in the evenings, Adalind catching up on some work and Nick reading through a few books he'd taken from the trailer that he hoped would shed some more light on the wesenrein.
Honestly, he felt a bit sick.
Hank noticed his sudden turn in behaviour but attributed his sullen mood to the break up with Juliette. He once again offered to go for drinks but Nick wasn't sure he knew what to say to his partner. It wasn't like he could explain that Juliette had been the furthest thing from his mind all day because it was so consumed with Adalind. He sincerely doubted it would go down well.
He didn't much think it would go down well with Monroe either but he desperately needed to talk about it and he could rely on Monroe to listen without judging him too harshly. He fully expected some judgement. He didn't even know how he'd wound up where he was. Seriously, how had this even happened? How had he gone from hating Adalind and wanting her dead to caring enough about her that the idea of her getting jumped and killed by one of those wesen assassins she'd joked about made his chest hurt and his stomach twist into knots?
He wished he could blame the baby. He really did but he'd been very honest with himself lately, that was how the whole Juliette break-up had come about, and so he couldn't lie now and pretend the baby was his sole reason. He hadn't even known about it until long after he and Adalind had formed this friendship thing.
Christ, did he have feelings for Adalind? Not just the feelings he'd already come to terms with but feelings.
'Dude,' Monroe muttered, one-part disgust, two-parts horrified fascination, 'I kind of think you do.'
Nick let his head hit the sticky bar, regretted it immediately, but couldn't help feeling the action was warranted. 'How did this happen?' he moaned. 'I'm supposed to hate her! We're supposed to hate each other not fall into a relationship without even noticing. How does that happen?'
As horrified as he was by the idea of Nick and Adalind as anything more than enemies, the whole thing seemed to amuse Monroe. At least that was the impression Nick got when he lifted his head from the bar and his friend said, 'Hey, you're the one that slept with her.'
'Out of necessity!' Nick protested, though his words lacked the conviction they'd once had. 'She stole my powers! What else was I supposed to do?'
Monroe shrugged. 'I don't know man. I mean, I want to give you advice but I'm not even sure if I'm supposed to be encouraging you or consoling you.'
Nick shot him a dirty look which lacked any real heat because he didn't know either. Did he want to be in a relationship with Adalind? Sure he'd thought about what it would be like to kiss her and he'd spent a good month or so with images of their morning together on a constant loop in his head (now he at least got a break between fantasies) but he was a guy and she was an incredibly attractive woman, it was only natural. Fantasising about sleeping with her again was one thing, actually being in a relationship, developing feelings for her, was another thing entirely.
'But what about Juliette?' Nick wondered.
Monroe hesitated, like he wasn't entirely sure he should say what he was thinking but went ahead and said it anyway. 'Is it possible the reason you and Juliette couldn't work passed your issues is because of your feelings for Adalind?'
That was a truly horrific thought, one he'd once dismissed but couldn't ignore any longer, and it stayed with him on the drive home. Was what Monroe had said true? Had his whatever-the-hell-it-was with Adalind coloured his relationship with Juliette? Had it pushed him to break things off by showing him the things he hadn't been willing to see? Had spending so much time with Adalind really changed the way he saw things so much that he'd broken things of with Juliette because he wanted Adalind instead?
He supposed, in a way, he had. If it weren't for Adalind, he wouldn't have realised how much he liked being able to tell someone about his day without the fear that something he said would push her away. With Juliette there'd always been that underlying worry that one day he would say something about his Grimm work that would push her too far. There was that fear that he would roll with one of the blows life hit him with when he probably shouldn't.
Isn't that kind of what he'd already done with Adalind though?
He'd brushed aside her tricking him into bed because it was just how things as a Grimm worked. He did something, Adalind reacted, or she did something to which he reacted to which she reacted that had him reacting which led to her taking away his powers and then him sleeping with her to get them back.
And he just accepted it, dealt with it and moved on. This time that attitude had (maybe) worked out for the best but it hadn't always. If he really thought about it, a lot of the things that went wrong in his life could be attributed to his and Adalind's constant struggle to defeat the other.
Which was another terrifying thought. How the hell had Adalind become such a significant part of his life without him realising it? It wasn't just now when they were living together and soon to have a baby but back when they'd been enemies too. Their friends and family just sort of got caught in the middle of this huge destructive loop.
And wow was that unhealthy. And while it didn't exactly reflect well on him that he'd let it happen, the worst thing that came with realising it was that once again he had to concede that Juliette might have a point. He'd brushed it off and been offended when she'd blamed him for all of the things that went wrong but he was starting to see that while it hadn't been intentional on his part he certainly had played a significant role in getting his friends hurt.
If he'd been honest with Hank sooner his partner would never have eaten the love cookies Adalind made, he'd never have been at risk from Adalind because he'd have known what he was dealing with. He still hadn't told Wu and look how that was turning out for him. Juliette's coma and memory loss had been a direct strike designed to hurt him and Monroe had certainly caught his share of flak for being friends with a Grimm.
About the only one who wasn't worse off for knowing him was Trubel and that was really only because he'd had answers she desperately needed to make sense of the world she was seeing. She also had the unique position of being completely free of Adalind's worse actions, she'd never been victim to one of Adalind's plans, never been caught between their fight.
He wondered if that was what made it easier for her to view Adalind as a friend. If because she'd never been hurt by Adalind she more easily accepted her and her role in his life now? Not that she knew the true extent of his relationship with Adalind or that he'd moved right in with her after his break up with Juliette.
Or would she still be hurt on Juliette's behalf when everything inevitably came out? Because sooner or later Nick was going to have a child and none of his friends were stupid, they'd be able to do the math and draw two conclusions. Either he'd cheated on Juliette with Adalind or Adalind had somehow duped him into believing the child was his. Which would inevitably drive them right back to the realisation that for him to even believe the child could be his then there'd have to have been sex involved at some point.
He didn't like the idea of Juliette finding out that way, of hurting her again when he'd already caused her so much pain but he didn't know how else he was supposed to tell her about it. He wasn't even sure he had to. He kind of just assumed that now they weren't together she would slowly but surely pull away from all things wesen. Because as much as she cared for Monroe and Rosalee any association she had with them would only increase her risk again of being in the same danger she'd accused Nick of bringing into her life. How could she have that shiny safe future she wanted if she stuck around wesen?
Was it lying to her when he never planned on her being a part of his Grimm life again? That thing with the kids had only happened because she'd been at Monroe's looking for him. When she no longer had a reason to seek him out then she wouldn't have a reason to see Adalind and their child or even him.
It wasn't a comfortable feeling, realising that he hoped he never had to see Juliette again but as selfish as it felt for many reasons it was also best for her. It served the purpose of keeping her free of the Grimm and wesen influences she wanted kept far away from her normal future and it prevented him from having to have a painful conversation about his dalliance with Adalind.
As much as he wanted it to be true, he didn't think Juliette would believe he hadn't known it was Adalind at the time when he was living with her now and apparently had developed feelings for her. Not that he would ever be telling Juliette that. He thought, if it ever came up (which he would do everything in his power to make sure it didn't), he'd just leave it at awkward co-parenting and not bring any feelings that may have developed along the way into it.
It was bad enough he'd told Monroe. Or maybe Monroe had told him?
Adalind looked up from her laptop when he stepped out of the elevator and smiled. 'Hey, how was Monroe?'
The question hit him with more force than such a simple one really should have because, holy fuck he'd actually texted her to let her know he was going to be late because he was having a beer with Monroe. What happened to not needing to know where he was? Hadn't she said that a couple of days after he'd moved in? That she wasn't his girlfriend and so she'd never ask him when he'd be home? Yet, rather than wait for her to ask he'd started letting her know and she'd done the same in kind. Whenever she had a work meeting or she was staying late to help out a student or her boss she texted him to let him know.
How had he not realised they were doing this sooner? How had the fact that he felt the need to let her know where he was and when he'd be home not driven home the realisation that they acted like a couple earlier?
Rather than answer her, he walked right up to her, took her face in his hands, bent down and kissed her. There was one nerve-wracking moment where she froze and he worried he'd made a mistake but then her lips moved and she was matching his kiss with a soft urgency of her own. And man, if he'd known she could kiss like that he probably wouldn't have waited so long to do it again.
Had he known she could kiss like that? He was sure it hadn't been like that when they'd been trying to get his powers back. Not that he could blame her, it hadn't exactly been a comfortable experience, at least not at first.
Eventually the need to breath had him breaking away from her. His breathing was ragged and he could only stare at her. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes slightly glazed but she was looking at him with such surprise and something that was definitely lust that he kind of wanted to kiss her again.
'What -' Adalind paused to swallow and tried again. 'What was that for?'
'Did you know we've basically been in a relationship for months?' he asked in response.
'What?' Adalind scrunched up her nose and gave him a look that suggested he should have his head examined. 'No we haven't, don't be ridiculous.'
'I just had a whole frightening conversation with Monroe about it.'
Adalind shook her head dismissively. 'I think I'd have known if we were.'
'Yeah,' Nick laughed, though it wasn't a particularly unhappy laugh, he thought it had a suspiciously hysterical edge to it. 'I thought so too.'
'Nick, come on,' she rolled her eyes. 'It's not like we,' she broke off with a frown and then began again with, 'I mean…' she trailed off into silence.
He saw it, the exact moment she caught on to what he was saying. The moment she re-evaluated all of their actions over the last months and not just the weeks since he'd moved in, and realised that actually, despite what they'd been telling themselves, they really had been acting all couple-y. She looked vaguely horrified.
'That's,' she sputtered, shook her head and tried again, 'God, how did that even happen?'
'I don't know,' Nick answered honestly. 'I only just realised it today at work.'
'Is that why you had a drink with Monroe?'
He nodded, pulling out the chair at the end of the table so he could slump into it. 'I needed another perspective.'
'And what did he say?' Adalind seemed strangely reluctant to hear his answer, like she was preparing for some bad news. He wasn't sure how anything he said beyond this point could be worse than realising they'd been acting out the steps of a relationship they hadn't even realised they were in.
Though did it really count as a relationship if you didn't know you were in it? Or could you just write the whole thing off as the general weirdness of their situation? It wasn't like they'd been having sex, that had to count for something, right?
'That I might have feelings for you.'
Clearly those words were not the ones she was expecting but that didn't mean she didn't enjoy hearing them. He could quite clearly see how she switched from dreading his words to elating in them. There was also some amusement there as well but he wasn't sure whether that was aimed at him or the situation.
'He thinks you might have feelings for me?'
And that was definitely amusement in her tone.
'It's a theory,' he admitted uncomfortably.
'One that is clearly based on something,' she pointed out. 'What have you been telling him?'
'Look,' Nick growled a little frustrated by her continued amusement. 'I don't know, okay? We were talking about all the little things you and I do and he said we were acting just like he and Rosalee do sometimes. It just kind of spiralled from there, okay? One minute we were talking about how you do that smile thing when you know you've impressed me but you're being modest and the next thing I know we were discussing if maybe my feelings for you were part of the reason I don't want to work things out with Juliette.'
He could tell as soon as he said it that she'd never in a million years have expected those words to come out of his mouth. He couldn't say he'd expected to ever think them, let alone acknowledge them out loud but he had. He'd said them and the words were having a strange effect on Adalind. She stopped smiling and for one horrible moment he thought he'd hurt her but when she spoke her words were soft and he realised he'd actually said something right.
'I think I might have feelings for you too.'
'Oh.' Nick cleared his throat. 'Ah.' His eyes darted away and then back again. 'Really?'
And the amusement was back. 'Did you really think I wouldn't?'
'Uh,' Nick really didn't know what to say. He'd been thinking himself in circles on the drive home, considering everything he and Monroe had talked about, everything he and Juliette had discussed but he could admit it hadn't once crossed his mind to wonder (or worry) about how Adalind felt. Until he'd come home and seen her he hadn't really known what he wanted to do about his own feelings let alone hers. Honestly, he still wasn't sure what he wanted to do about it.
As if she'd come to a decision, Adalind got to her feet and held out a hand to him. 'Nick?'
'Yeah?' he asked, looking up at her, his voice huskier than ever.
'We're going to have sex now.'
'What?'
She laughed and the sound sent a pleasant hum right down south. He reached out and took her hand and didn't protest when she led him back to their bedroom.