AN: Thank you for your kind words on the last chapter. Was really unsure how it would received, so glad everyone seemed to think it was okay, and hope it didn't turn too many off from the story.

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He comes awake slowly, aware Adalind has said something.

"Hmm?"

"Nick, your alarm is going off."

"Okay," he murmurs, going back to sleep. If there was a threat or danger she'd sound more emotional some part of his brain helpfully supplies. He snuggles deeper into the nest of formerly golden hair, his hand gliding up a soft, warm, stomach, encountering a warm, plump breast. An idea starts forming and he pulls her tighter against him, testing it. She wriggles enticingly. Something's beeping in the background annoyingly, but he ignores it in favor of the warm, sexy woman he's holding in his arms.

"Nick!" Adalind says sharply, and he opens his eyes again. "Your alarm. Today's your first day of work."

Oh, right.

That's the annoying beep. The alarm on his watch. He sighs as he comes more awake, taking in the fact he's spooned tightly against a naked Adalind in the confines of his sleeping bag. He looks at his watch, still beeping persistently and he wrestles a numb arm out from under Adalind's head to shut it off.

He lays there for a moment, gathering his wits, before he fights against the bag, Adalind grunting as he knocks into her, when she motions with her arm and telekinetically unzips the zipper enough so he can climb out. He struggles to his feet, joints cracking with every move.

Jesus, when did he get so old?

His body aches from lying in an uncomfortable position on the floor all night, though really, he hasn't found a comfortable one yet in the nights he's slept there. Some of the aches aren't because of slumbering on a hard surface, and he smirks a little, remembering last night with Adalind.

"Stop smiling," Adalind says, watching him, but she's smiling a little, too. "I know what you're thinking."

"A nice start to my morning?" he suggests because that's exactly what he's thinking, looking down at her, hair fanned out messily around her, cleavage visible before she snuggles deeper into the bag.

"You can't be late for work. It's your first day," she reminds him and she's right. He sighs disappointedly at the missed opportunity for some delightful morning sex. He grabs the uniform he's to wear as a fish and game warden and his work boots and heads down the stairs to shower. When he gets out of the bathroom, Adalind's dressed in her nightgown again and rummaging in the kitchen.

Addison, he reminds himself. Addy, his wife. He's never once called her anything but Adalind (except maybe that time or two, or ten he referred to her as that bitch that ruined his whole life). He sobers, thinking about the progression of their relationship, how complicated and twisted it all was—is—that it should end up with them here like this. On the run, sharing a cabin in the woods and two children, because he can't live without her now.

He tries out Addy silently, then Addison again, and looks at Adalind, knowing nothing will ever fit her, and his complex feelings for her, as perfectly as those three syllables.

But that's Nick Burkhardt's feelings, influenced by his complicated life and history with her as a Grimm.

David Johnson's feelings are not complicated. He loved Addison enough to marry her, and as his wife it really shouldn't be any big deal to call her by an appellation. Addy. Sweetheart, baby, honey, all of them just sound wrong and insincere when he thinks of them in connection to Adalind.

It occurs to him, not for the first time obviously, but maybe for the first time the extent of how difficult it will be to start this new life with new identities, so wholly foreign to their original ones.

"Do you want some breakfast?" Adalin—Addison, asks him and he flashes a smile and shakes his head. There's no place to eat it anyway, except the floor, or standing up. He takes a seat on one of the stairs, the only place to sit, and puts on his socks and work boots. The uniform's made of a heavy, durable, and rather uncomfortable material, but it's new, and Nick supposes after a few washings it won't feel so scratchy. Still, he feels self-conscious in it, aware something about it doesn't fit quite right, and he wonders if it's a metaphor for everything else in his life right now.

"I don't know what you're talking about, you look pretty damn sexy in uniform," Adal—Addison. Addison, Addison, Addison, tells him. She's looking him over slowly, reverently, as though he's something she might like to devour.

"I'm kind of looking forward to tonight, when I can help get you out of uniform," she says mischievously and Nick raises an eyebrow at her. "When I can finally corrupt a nice, young, upstanding officer of the law. Or at least the Park service."

"You've been corrupting officers since the day I met you," Nick tells her.

"I never got the chance to corrupt you," she reminds him, though he's not sure if that's exactly true. He can remember the reactions to some of her words, how angry they made him, yes, but the other reactions they elicited, too. Attraction. Excitement. The thrill of the challenge that Adalind always represented. Things he's hardly ever admitted to himself and definitely not to anyone else. In some ways, it's was inevitable that they end of like this. They always had a certain kind of chemistry together, electricity that crackled between them every time they faced off to one another.

"You had plenty of chances, as I recall. Just none of them worked."

"Disappointed?" she asks lightly, though the subject matter is far heavier than either one is making it out to be.

"A little," he admits, to both their surprise.

"Would the honorable Detective Burkhardt really have taken advantage of me if I gave him the opportunity?"

"Maybe," he says and her eyebrows raise. Most likely not, it's true, but there's that part of him that wonders, too.

"Well now I wish I had tried harder," she says.

"If you tried any harder one or both of us would probably be dead," he points out. Maybe maybe is a bit of a stretch, given everything she'd done, but he doesn't know, in the heat of the moment, immersed in anger and frustration if she'd given him another outlet for it that he wouldn't have taken it. Their entire relationship defied all logic.

"You know, I told you under different circumstances you and I could really have had some fun."

"We're having fun now, aren't we?" Nick says waving a hand around them. The sparse cabin, buried in the woods, with who knows what looking for them.

"We had fun last night," she counters seductively. He remembers her woging and feels something churn deep in his chest. A strange feeling. That thrill again. The sense of the predator who has bested his prey. Except she's more than that to him.

She leans in, hovering over him for a kiss, and he turns his face up to meet her, reminding himself that David would accept, and give, affection readily to his wife. He pulls her down into his lap, Adalind's expression reflecting the surprise she feels at this sudden exhibition of affection from him.

"Are you and the kids going to be okay without me?" he asks her, nuzzling against the side of her face, because, he tells himself, David would nuzzle against his wife, wouldn't hesitate to show affection to her. He plants a kiss against the side of her head and wraps his arms around her and Adalind returns the gesture as she leans against him for a moment.

"Of course. Hexenbiest, remember?" she says lightly, but there's no forgetting that. It's one of the things that makes leaving her alone with his children more palatable, the fact that she's hardly defenseless, and as a Hexenbiest she's very skilled at handling any threats that may come her way. Still, everything he values in this world is right here in this cabin and it's unsettling to leave it, especially when he's not sure if Renard is still looking for him, or anyone else for that matter.

"We'll be okay," she promises.

"You got everything you need, right?" he asks her, because he'll be taking the jeep, and she's stuck here with no means of transportation should something happen, and that unsettles him, too. What if Kelly or Diana gets hurt and needs medical treatment? They're so far out into the boonies that an ambulance might get there too late.

"Yeah, we'll be fine. Oh, how 'bout some coffee?" she asks him, and he nods, reluctantly releasing her so she can bounce up and hurry to the carafe. He hears a noise from the direction of the children's rooms and then Kelly fussing as he comes awake and aware, before he cries.

"Ah, Kelly's awake," he announces and Adalind smiles wryly. "I'll change him," he volunteers, although really, it's routine by now. Even when they were living at the loft, Nick was always the one who changed him first thing in the morning while Adalind readied a bottle for him.

"Okay," she says.

He greets his son quietly, Kelly pausing for breath to see who answered his calls, before wriggling insistently and resuming his cries.

"It's not that bad," Nick soothes. "Daddy's here. He'll change you," he promises, although apparently it is that bad, because Kelly's cries only intensify. He's almost done putting a new diaper on when he realizes he's got a visitor in the room with him.

"Morning," he says to Diana, managing not to jump in surprise when she comes up beside him quietly. Diana telekinetically moves some objects on top of the bureau-slash-changing table and Kelly quiets immediately, watching in rapture as she swirls them above his head.

"Thank you," Nick says, picking his son up and holding him close. He's so thankful he can hold his son in his arms again. He missed him terribly when Kelly was gone, like a part of him had been cleaved from his body.

"He missed you, too," Diana announces, and Nick looks at her, trying to mask the unease he feels at her being able to read his thoughts so easily. Another wave of discomfort washes over him as he thinks about some other thoughts he's had, most about her mother, and turns away to grab something, in case his eyes are the windows to his soul, or some other nonsense like that.

He latches onto a lone toy, a stuffed fox from Rosalee that Kelly's had since they brought him home from the hospital. He wonders how his friends are doing, if they've given up looking for them, and hopes things in Portland are okay without him.

He tells himself they have to be, because he's not going back. He can't go back. He's not a Grimm anymore, he's a father and a husband with responsibilities at home to take care of. Trubel and Eve can help everyone handle things he tells himself firmly.

"You miss your friends," Diana says, uncannily in line with his thoughts.

"Can you—Are you—" he starts, and she stares up at him, waiting for him to continue. "Can you read people's thoughts?" he asks her, wondering if he needs to start policing the things that go through his mind when he's looking at her mother. Or her, because some of the things he's been thinking, about stripping her of her powers, probably wouldn't be well received if she knew the half of it.

"No," she says, and he breathes out slowly, in relief. "Not really," and he tenses again. "Sometimes I can sense something inside a person," she tells him.

"And you sense Kelly missed me?"

She nods.

"And you miss your friends," she says. He nods, because he's not sure what else to do in the face of this somewhat unsettling knowledge she has.

"I do," he admits, "But they'll be okay."

"You don't really believe that," she says to him, but fortunately, Adal—he's got to stop thinking of her like that-Addison interrupts, holding out a mug of coffee.

"There's my handsome guy," she coos to Kelly who smiles widely at his mother, before fussing, apparently letting on in his baby speak all the ways Nick's lacking in getting him together this morning. "I bet you're hungry, huh?" she says, taking her son when Nick offers him and cradling him in her arms. She had been ready to wean him from breastfeeding before she left Nick, but due to their limited supplies and situation, that's been put off for the time being. He doesn't think Kelly's saddened by the fact.

Given how perfect her breasts are, Nick certainly wouldn't be sad for the extended opportunity to admire them, though he concedes Kelly probably has a different view of them than Nick does. He takes a sip of his coffee before remembering Diana's still standing right next to him. Staring at him. He chokes, and coughs to cover it up, and Adalind looks up from where she's feeding their son.

"Did I make it too strong?"

"No, it's fine," he assures, eyes darting to her daughter guiltily. He smiles, hoping she'll stop staring at him and praying whatever it is that clues her in on things is not radiating from him right now.

She doesn't smile back.

"What time do you think you'll be home?" Adalind asks, and Nick drags his eyes away from Diana.

"I don't know. Late," he says. "Jake's going to be with me, showing me around the area I'll be covering."

Jake's his boss, a wiry man about ten years younger than Nick. There's another game warden out of their office Nick hasn't met, but has heard about it. Ted Riley. He's older than Nick, and built like a truck based on the picture of him, but he'd been on leave when Nick had interviewed and come into the office to do paperwork, and wasn't due back yet for another month. Nick hasn't mentioned Ted to Adalind, and specifically why he's out of the office on leave.

He'd been mauled by a bear, and he doesn't think Adalind would be comforted to know this. Nick's not really comforted with the knowledge.

Addison likely wouldn't be, either.

"Be careful," Adalind advises. "I don't want to be widowed on your first day."

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After a goodbye kiss from Addy (no, he still has a hard time thinking of her as that), and smiles from the kids (well, a kid), Nick's in the car driving the thirty miles to the base camp that encompasses his office, basically, when he's not roaming the woods and the hillside for illegal hunters or activities.

It's east of Whitefish, and most of civilization, for that matter, and reminds Nick more of a ranger station, which he supposes it really is, than an office. He parks the jeep in front of the six hundred square foot building and takes a deep breath.

He's about to spend his first full day selling the lie that is David Johnson. He checks the pistol he was issued, in case he needs it, and grabs the thick coat that's part of his uniform and steps inside the office, half expecting law enforcement to descend on him as soon as he opens the door.

"Hey Dave, morning," Jake says, glancing at him briefly before turning back to one of the office machines. Nick's glad Jake's not looking at him because it takes him a moment to realize that Dave is him, even though he should know it by now.

"Hey, Jake," Nick says.

"Be with you in just a sec," Jake tells him, waving some papers around. "That desk is yours, if you want to take a seat," he adds, pointing to a metal desk not unlike the one he had at Portland, devoid of any of the detritus that surrounds them, other than a desk phone and an ancient computer.

"Okay," Nick agrees, easing gingerly into the chair behind it. The chair is as old as the computer and it feels unfamiliar, his body used to the ergonomic chair he had as a detective. He looks around at the office, taking in details he'd studied before when he was first here.

There's a map of Montana on one of the walls, and a topographical map taking up most of the west wall of the building. There's a red border etched within it, denoting the area that Jake's wardens cover, and Nick studies it carefully, trying to memorize it. It covers multiple counties and various terrains, some mountain and hillside, some valley, others lakes and streams. He notes Whitefish on the map and mentally calculates where his cabin is, probably no more than ten linear miles away, but there's nowhere near them that they can get to by just driving a straight line. It's all hills and curves, the same as his drive here, in the opposite direction.

There's several bulletin boards on the wall next to him, filled with documents pinned to the corkboard, notices and the like, and he's relieved to see there still isn't one of he or Adalind. Relieved and unnerved. He doesn't know what that means, that Renard doesn't have an APB out for them, demanding his head for the murder of the officers of the north precinct, and whatever else he can pin on Nick.

The other end has a TV, surprisingly one of the newer style flat screens, and a small kitchenette where Nick can smell coffee brewing. The bathroom is located there as well as a rear entrance that Nick makes note of, too.

In between Nick's desk and the kitchen is another desk, Ted's, covered with papers, and a couple of picture frames. Nick peers closely at them, trying to get a feel for the other man he'll be working with. One picture is of Ted and another man, also dressed in the fish and game warden uniform, perhaps the man Nick replaced, and Nick wonders what happened to him. Was he fatally mauled by the same bear that got hold of Ted?

The other picture is of a furry dog, with a long snout, and Nick inexplicably thinks of Monroe. He can imagine what Monroe would say should he ever mention this fact to him, the indignant look, and he misses the Blutbad so much in that moment it hurts.

"That's Ted, and Drew," Jake says, coming around beside Nick and noticing where his attention is directed. "He's the guy before you."

"He wasn't mauled by the bear, too, was he?" Nick asks.

"No, took a job near Helena. Got a fiancé that lives there. Met her when she came and worked a season here in Whitefish."

Even though they're thirty miles out from Whitefish, it's still the closest recognizable town near them.

"The dog's Ed."

"Ed and Ted?" Nick says, trying to hide a smile.

"Yeah," Jakes says in a tone that says he knows exactly what Nick's thinking, and agrees. "Wait until you meet them both," Jake adds.

"Here, come on, grab a cup of coffee and we'll go over a few things and then we'll head out."

"Okay," Nick says, getting up and following Jake to the kitchen. They spend about an hour going over some stuff, what a typical day looks like, the expectations of the job, and the new news that's just come through, and Nick tries not to tense, wondering if it's a BOLO on a man and a woman, or news about a body found hours away in Idaho.

It's neither. It's information about a wolf that's been seen roaming the woods, and some dead animals that seem to be left in its wake. Nick's spidey sense begins to buzz and he wonders if it's more than a wolf they're looking for.

"This early winter's been tough," Jake tells him as Nick follows him out to Jake's truck. They drive off to survey the area where he's last been seen. "Food sources are scarce and they're getting aggressive. He's getting aggressive anyway. Last night he attacked some people near Pine, and now we've got to take care of it."

He supposes it's not that alarming that a hungry animal might become bolder as food becomes harder to find. Still, he can't help wondering if it's just as simple an explanation as that.

"Did anyone interview the victims?" Nick asks, and berates himself silently. He sounds exactly like a detective would, and he hopes Jake doesn't notice it. As far as Jake knows, David Johnson has never worked as a detective. He spent the last fifteen years in the army and then worked some odd jobs over the last couple of years.

"Yeah, I talked to them last week. Bout what you'd expect," Jake says dismissively, and Nick hides his frown. He thinks there's more information there than Jake might be aware of, but what can he say? He's not the lead investigator, he's not an investigator at all, and he's certainly not a Grimm working a Wesen problem.

Although, it would be good to know if that was what this was – a Wesen problem.

They spend most of the morning, driving a portion of the area Nick will be responsible for, tracking the wolf's movements.

"We got a chip on him last week, so we can monitor his whereabouts. He wasn't happy about that," Jake remarks with a chuckle and Nick glances at him, still wondering what they're dealing with.

"You got to wear those glasses all the time?" he asks suddenly and Nick glances at him again.

"Yeah, photosensitivity issue," Nick says, self-consciously adjusting them.

"You get that in the army? One of those flash grenades or something?" Jake asks him, and Nick nods.

"I don't remember much about it, what happened," Nick says, hoping that will deter any deeper questions as to what happened to his eyes. "Don't much like to talk about it."

"Damn," Jakes says, shaking his head. "How long you been like that?"

"About six years, I guess, going on, anyway," Nick says.

"You married?"

"Uh, yeah, just somewhat recently so," Nick stumbles, hoping that that fact will explain away some of his surprise.

"Yeah? Any kids?"

"Uh, yeah, two kids, one of them hers, from a previous relationship."

"Yeah? I got three kids myself," and Nick glances at him in surprise.

"I know, right?" Jake says in amusement. "I started early."

"I started late," Nick says, wondering for a moment if he'll ever have any more children, or if this is it for he and Adalind. Reminds himself a second later what the hell is he thinking. They're not on a pleasure trip to the mountains, and another child would complicate an already incredibly complicated situation. They're trying to survive with the two they have now. It's way too soon in this experiment to be pondering adding their family.

"Eight, six, and three, all girls."

"Wow," Nick says. He did start early. He estimates Jake's probably not even thirty and that would put his firstborn child when he was twenty-one, and he suspects it was earlier than that. Nineteen, maybe?

"Ten and not even one," he offers after a moment, because it would seem strange if Nick—Dave—didn't. "Girl and a boy."

"Oh, wow, that's a big age difference. Ah, here we are," Jake says, pulling to a stop and shutting down the engine, and Nick's glad to get off the subject of his personal life. He looks out the windshield while Jake fiddles with the GPS tracker. They're up the mountain a ways, probably about ten miles from the station, Nick estimates. There's a map of the mountain roads and trails they're driving, and Nick's been squinting at it wondering how he's going to keep from getting lost. The most forest Nick has had to deal with comes from Portland's many parks, and while he might have been traipsing through the woods a time or two, most of the time he was never far from the city and somehow always had his bearings. He's gotten some practice these last few weeks, as he and Adalind have inhabited one remote cabin and then another, but this is nothing like that.

"Anybody live up here?" Nick asks Jake and Jake shakes his head.

"Shouldn't be. This is state park, here, no one can live on it, but about five miles east of here there's some land that's been settled on outside the park. A couple of cabins, but most people up here don't live here year-round. Winters are brutal." Nick's reminded that they're not even in the dead of winter yet, and wonders what that means for Nick and Adalind and the kids.

"Right," Nick says, getting out of the car to look around. They've been driving a trail up the mountain, following the wolf tracker for about an hour. He tunes his hearing, listening absently as Jakes thumbs the dials, drowning out the noise of the wind whipping through the tall, knotty pines. He thinks he hears it, the rustle of something moving in the forest nearby and turns his eyes towards the sound.

There's snow on the ground, but it's undisturbed except for their few footprints, and Nick watches as Jake takes a few steps ahead of him, glancing down at his handheld computer.

"This way," he says and takes the lead, Nick following behind, ears alert for anything unfamiliar. The snow's about a foot deep up here, but packed tightly and crusted over, and Nick can almost put his full weight on it without sinking down, so that when the snow does give way to him, he almost loses his balance and falls face first.

"Careful!" Jake advises with a chuckle and Nick nods, smiling self-deprecatingly, as he carefully gets to his feet.

There, almost fifty yards away is the wolf, watching him.

Nick stares back, almost not believing his eyes. He looks the animal over carefully, but it's indeed an animal, not a Wesen creature, and Nick's unbelievably relieved at this fact. There's a tag through his ear, a torn ear, Nick notes, as though the animal, or another, tried to tear or chew it off him. He's massive, too, much bigger than Nick anticipated, and he's seen wolves before so he doesn't know why it surprises him.

"Jake," Nick dares to whisper, afraid he'll startle the animal.

"I see it," Jake says quietly, slowly moving a hand towards his sidearm. It's a dart gun, one that will probably fall short at the range they're at from the target. The wolf stares down Nick for another moment and then dashes away, deep into the forest and Nick breathes out a loud sigh.

"Jesus, did you see how big he was?" Jake asks him and Nick nods. "Huge. Haven't ever seen a wolf that big before."

"Don't they usually hunt in packs?" Nick asks and Jake nods.

"Usually, but this one's been alone every time we've tracked its movements."

It's unusual, Nick thinks, but he's hardly an expert on wolves, though he feels he's probably more informed than most.

Jake looks around them carefully, face pensive, before moving off in a direction about thirty degrees left from the one the wolf disappeared to, climbing up the tree-lined hillside. Nick follows, after a moment, stepping carefully and mulling the strange behavior of the wolf.

"Ah, here it is," Jake says and Nick crests the hill and finds Jake and the carcass he's referring to. It's an elk, Nick identifies, recently killed judging by the looks of it and Nick traces the blood spatter around the animal with his cop eyes, looking for anomalies. He approaches the animal carefully, some part of him mindful about disturbing a crime scene, which is ridiculous because they're way out here in the woods, where Nature's just being Nature, and Jake's obviously not concerned about any crime that's been committed since he's right next to the animal, bending down to take a look.

"Neck's torn," he says, and Nick nods. The tears were clearly committed by an animal, likely the wolf. "Leg's missing, too," Jake says, looking around.

"There," Nick points, following a blood trail down the side of hill. He spies the torn hind leg of the elk near the base of a tree and heads towards it. There's no tracks here, though, given the amount of weight the snow's supporting that's not surprising. The wolf, though massive, probably weighs at least fifty pounds less than he does, and he's hardly making any indentations, making the descent an extra degree of fun he could do without. He makes sure to jab his booted heel in with each step, trying to get a foothold as he gets closer. He stops about twenty feet away, something catching his eye.

He looks carefully, but he can't figure out what he's seen that makes him pause until he feels a breeze pass through and he sees it again.

A piece of fabric, caught in the brush, and he maneuvers awkwardly towards it. He gingerly touches it, a thin piece of blue and grey flannel and wonders how it got up here and why. He looks down at the leg a few feet away and then around the forest, feeling that tingling in his body that indicates a threat is near.

He sees nothing though, hears nothing, and he has his Grimm hearing tuned tightly for any sound. All that he can hear are Jake's boots crunching over the snow as he moves around the elk carcass and Nick almost snaps at him to stop.

"Well, come on, let's head back to the truck," Jake says and Nick turns his head to the side towards him in acknowledgement.

"Okay," Nick says, debating on sharing his find with him.

"You find something interesting?"

"Piece of fabric," Nick says, holding it up and reluctantly retracing his steps. It feels like whatever's there is watching him, and now his back is to it. He wonders if it's the wolf. He's so tightly wound, waiting for it to make its move that he keeps his head half turned in anticipation. He struggles to hang onto the fabric as he ascends the hill and finally makes it back to Jake after a few minutes.

"Looks like a piece of flannel," Nick says, showing it to him. "How do you think it got there?" Nick asks. Jakes examines it and shakes his head.

"Probably a hunter," he says. "Lots of them up here looking for meat and game. Most of them without a license. Those are the kinds of people you'll be looking for. Not usually much excitement up here otherwise, besides this," Jake adds, waving his hand behind them, indicating the wolf and the dead elk.

"Although, sometimes that's excitement enough. Just ask Ted when he gets back," Jake says with a hearty laugh.

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