Hello, my lovelies. It's time for Damon to return, for more live changing events and more. Enjoy!

Chapter 11: How to Open a Restaurant

Standing inside the restaurant Kol was enthusiastic. It was the week that Damon would be released from the hospital and everyone in their little group was gathered together to welcome him back. While Damon was under observation, Elijah had gone about the work of finding the proper venue, hiring a crew and filling out the necessary paperwork. The restaurant was to open that night. That was their surprise for Damon.

Elena and Stefan had gone to the hospital to pick Damon up while everyone else was setting up for opening night. Bonnie was putting away ice cream in the standup freezer. Caroline was trying to learn how to make spaghetti from scratch while Elijah examined a cookbook. Katherine was mixing ingredients into a bowl for the noodles while ignoring Elijah's reciting the recipe.

"My sister's boyfriend is a Salvatore." Katherine was muttering to herself.

"And?" Elijah questioned, absently as Katherine picked up a handful of flour and threw it in his face.

Chuckling, Klaus came into the kitchen in a suit with a glass of wine in his hand. "That is a beautiful look, Lijah. Where is my camera?"

Katherine picked up a handful of flour and aimed for Klaus. She managed to hit Tyler instead just as he walked into the kitchen between Katherine and her intended victim. "I brought a little extra help." He inclined his head toward Hayley who got hit with Katherine's next attempt to hit Klaus with another pile of flour.

Growling, Hayley wiped the flour off her face. "Whoa. Really?/! I came to help because I thought that this was about your friend who is going through a really hard time and you guys are acting like a bunch of kids?"

Kol hopped off the table he had been sitting on and smirked at the newcomer. "Gee, and I thought Lena, Bonnie and Care were the judgy ones in our little group."

Ignoring Kol, Hayley turned to Klaus. "Hello, again."

Klaus blinked rapidly as Caroline stepped in between the two. Caroline reached out and took Klaus' wine glass and took a long sip, looking at Hayley over the rim of the glass. After finishing the contents she allowed her lips to curl upward. "You know, I think the wait staff really needs some help. So, if you don't mind… We're good back here."

Hayley looked at Klaus, who was not hiding his smirk of satisfaction, before she turned away and walked into the dining room. When Caroline turned around Kol and Bonnie were looking at each other trying to not laugh. Even Katherine had forgotten to throw more flour at Klaus. Elijah took that opportunity to throw some flour at Katherine.

"Oh! It is on!" Katherine shouted, picking up a large handful of flour and soon the team were running around the kitchen with anything they could find to contain flour in and hid from each other.

This is the state Damon, Stefan and Elena found the group in. When the group saw Damon they stopped in their actions and looked at him with varying degrees of sobriety. That was until Damon took a handful of flour and sprinkled it over Stefan's hair. For his part Stefan just stood there with a strained serious expression while his eyes glittered with amusement.

"Who's next?" Damon called happily to his friends.

"Be careful." Elena called, looking around at the sharp objects as Kol and Bonnie ran away from Damon, who had grabbed a mixing bowl and a few eggs along the way. They went into the walk-in and then came running out.

"Dear God, Nik and Care are at it again. What are they, bunnies?" Kol shouted to the group before Damon hit him with an egg. "You will regret that, Salvatore." Kol yelled in mock fury. He grabbed the mixing bowl with the pasta mix in it. He held out the bowl to Bonnie, who reached into it and made a few little pasta balls to throw at their friend.

"This is a waste of product." Elijah called from his place under a table. Katherine was hiding in the freezer with Tyler. They had to run past Caroline and Klaus to get out and back into the war zone.

"Hey, guys. We're opening in the next couple of hours. We have nothing prepared and the kitchen is a mess." Elena called.

"What do you mean you're opening the restaurant tonight?" Damon asked, confused.

"Surprise?" Katherine said wrapping her arms around Elijah, who looked slightly surprised himself before she crushed an egg over his head.

Damon's shoulders slumped as he looked at his friends. "Okay, so we have lot of work to do. We need aprons. Someone needs to go home and get my cookbooks. Umm… I need to make sure that we have enough stock. Do we have enough staff? Does anyone, other than Stef, and I, know how to cook properly?" He looked around at the others. "Never mind. We need prep work done like yesterday."

Coming out of the walk-in Caroline was grinning and straightening her clothes. "Hi, guys. What do you need to me to do?"

Turning around, Damon grabbed her by the shoulders. "I need your organizational skills. Now." Nodding Caroline picked up a pad of paper and began to order the others to do things.

"I'll go to retrieve the cookbooks." Kol offered.

"I'll come with you." Bonnie added, looking at him hesitantly.

Frowning, Tyler looked at the two. "Yeah, you can take my car and Klaus. He needs to do something other than Caroline." He tossed his car keys to Klaus. "I'm going to see if Hayley needs help."

Kol, Bonnie, and Klaus walked out of the restaurant and into the parking lot. "Nik, what's up with you and nurse hot pants?" Kol inquired as he got into the passenger seat beside his brother.

Klaus' jaw tensed up as he started the car, watching Bonnie buckle her seat belt. "I flirted with her one night. That is as far as it went-"

"Oh. Please!" Bonnie scoffed. She folded her arms over her chest and glared at the back of her best friend's husband's head. "That is what every man has said since the beginning of time."

Growling, Klaus glared at the windshield. His foot pressed down on the gas pedal. "Hey, Nik, can you perhaps slow down a bit?" Kol asked, feeling uncomfortable, and wishing he hadn't opened his mouth.

"For your information, Bonnie, I told Caroline about what happened. I've been sleeping on the couch ever since." Klaus informed the others while he deflated and eased up on the gas. "I don't know what's happening. I feel like I am losing her and there is nothing I can do about it…"

"Caroline loves you, Klaus." Bonnie reassured him as she leaned forward and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Yes, I know she does… but sometimes love is not enough. So, for a few minutes I allowed myself to talk to another girl who did not know anything about me and I was worrying about whether she approved of me. I wasn't worried about whether I remembered to pay the light bill because she asked me to or picked up the gallon of milk. It was stupid. I love Caroline. She is my first love. I intend for her to be my last love and to be hers as well… but I don't know how to get back to where we were."

Kol looked at Bonnie in the rearview mirror and Bonnie was looking out the window. Silently he promised himself he would help his brother repair his marriage. When that was done he would do everything to win Bonnie back. One thing at a time. Maybe helping his brother would help him figure out how to get his love back.

Once the car was parked in front of Damon's and Elena's house Bonnie hopped out of the car and hurried up to the front door. "Did anyone I don't know ask Damon or Elena for a key to the house?" Looking at Klaus, Kol puffed his checks out. "Okay, then. Back to the restaurant. Klaus put a hand up and Kol turned around to see Bonnie pulling a key from underneath a flower pot.

Opening the door Bonnie walked into the house. She waited for Kol and Klaus to make their way up to the door. Kol walked a little too close to her and smirked when she inhaled deeply.

"If I were a cookbook where would I be?" Klaus asked as he walked into the kitchen followed by Kol and Bonnie. They had all been in Damon's kitchen but they all realized that they knew very little about where Damon kept anything.

"In a drawer?" Kol said pulling random drawers open and then closing them. With the opening of each new compartment he found nothing that looked like a book. Bonnie was looking through the cabinets and had come up with nothing. Klaus was pouring himself a drink. "Nik!" Kol snapped. "What are you doing?"

"Thinking." Klaus replied, swirling his drink.

"Well, can you try something new like, I don't know, helping." Bonnie snapped at Klaus.

Smirking, Klaus hopped onto the counter. "I am helping. I am thinking that an artist does not leave his work out in the open."

"In a drawer or a cabinet is not out in the open, Klaus." Bonnie replied groaning and closing another door.

"Yes, but, you know, I keep my paintings in my studio because that is where I work. That does not mean that everyone keeps the work in the place in which they work. So, if I were not working in my studio and I was making a sketch I might take my work…" Klaus walked out of the kitchen and into the living room.

Kol and Bonnie followed Klaus as he walked out of the living room and into the dining room. "What's he doing?" Bonnie whispered to Kol leaning closer to him as she spoke.

"I have no idea." Kol whispered back as his brother walked back out and then headed for the stairs. They followed him up and then watched as Klaus began to open drawers in the master bedroom.

"I found Elena's underwear." Klaus told them with a smirk. "Damon ought to take the poor girl shopping." Closing the drawer he went to the night stand.

"Are you sure that there wasn't anything in the dresser?" Kol called as he sidled over to it and started to open Elena's underwear drawer again before Bonnie wedged herself between her ex and her friend's clothing.

"No, I don't think there is anything in there that you need to worry about." Bonnie said jutting her chin out.\Her eyes were challenging him to go ahead and make a move.

Kol grinned and then pinned her to the dresser. "No, I don't think there is anything in Elena's drawers I care about."

Bonnie gasped as Kol ran his hand over her side. She turned to look at Klaus who was ignoring them. He was pulling the drawers open and closing them. Then he pulled the last one out and began to knock on the bottom. Klaus began to smile as Kol's lips brushed against Bonnie's earlobe.

"Okay. I found it. Kol you can stop sexually harassing you ex." Klaus said as he knocked out a false bottom to the drawer and pulled out five filled note books. He began to flip through them. "Yes, I do believe I found them." He grinned excitedly at his brother and Bonnie who looked slightly embarrassed.

As Klaus walked out of the room he stopped in the doorway. "If you two want to make out in the back I won't stop you. However, Bonnie before things go too far you might want to make up your mind whether you want to be with my brother or not since you are living with another man." With that said, Klaus hurried back down the stairs.

"Oh, God. This is so wrong. I'm with Tyler." Bonnie said pressing her hands over her face.

Kol pulled her hands away and pressed his lips to hers. "Does that feel wrong?" He pulled back and pressed his lips to her neck. "Or that?" Pressing his lips to her shoulder. "Or that?" Before he could say another word Bonnie leapt into his arms and wrapped her legs around his waist. She didn't have to say or do anything else. He carried her over to the bed and soon they forgot about Tyler, the restaurant, or that Klaus was downstairs waiting for them.

Forty-five minutes later Kol was sitting up and buttoning his pants and Bonnie ran into the bathroom and came back out in less than five minutes. When she grabbed a shoe from where it had fallen under the bed Kol took the opportunity to pull her to him. "I missed you, Bon."

Bonnie pressed her forehead to his. "I missed you, too." She pressed her lips to his but pulled away before he could make a move to continue. "We need to get back. The others need help. There will be plenty of time for that later."

"So, you're going to end things with Tyler." Kol asked pulling his shirt on.

"Well, yeah. I mean I'm not that woman who has sex with her ex and then goes back to her boyfriend like everything's just fine." Bonnie said as she pulled her shoes on.

"But you went back to him after that night we made out on the lawn." Kol said quietly as he stared at his own shoes.

"Yes, I told Tyler what happened and he said we would talk about it. But that's the thing. We don't talk about the things that bother us. We don't share like we used to… I need that… I need to be with someone I can tell everything to without feeling like that there is a line which you can't cross. I need to be able to bare my soul." Bonnie told Kol.

"Among other things." Kol joked as Bonnie smacked him lightly on the shoulder.

"Okay, we need to go downstairs and see if Nik left us to fend for ourselves." Kol replied before they walked downstairs he kissed her again. "I love you, Bonnie."

Looking up at Kol Bonnie felt lighter than she had in some time. "I love you, too, Kol." They hurried down the stairs and out the front door. Klaus was sitting in Tyler's car talking on his cell phone to someone. He was smiling happily when they got in the car. "What are you so happy about?" Kol asked.

"Caroline believes she had food poisoning." Klaus said merrily.

"And that's a good thing?" Kol asked.

"Yes." Klaus said.

"Why?" Kol asked.

Smirking, Klaus shook his head. "Because I can quite assure you we have not been anywhere she could have gotten food poisoning from. I know I'm not the great chef but we've been eating at home. Even if she ate something at the restaurant it has not been long enough for food poisoning to take affect..."

"So, you think that she's pregnant?" Bonnie asked him.

"Yes, I think she might be." Klaus said with a huge grin. "I made a doctor's appointment for her for tomorrow. So, we'll know soon enough."

Kol and Bonnie smiled at each other. Their little group was expanding everyday it seemed. They knew that nothing was going to be easy right now or anytime soon but right now they wanted to bask in the glow of something new. What life had in store for them next they didn't know but they would face it together.

TBC

I hope this chapter didn't feel as though I was trying to wrap the story up with a big bow because it is far from over, although I will be taking a break from writing this story to concentrate on graduating again. Please, check my profile page for when the story will reappear.

Thank you SteVie's GirL, Fallen Witch Angel, Guest, jessinicole, Tinyflyer02 and love-angelgaby.

Love,

LL