The Claudia Zacchara Collective

Story One

The Dark Side, canon

August 2008

Part Two

Rated R

Nikolas feels Claudia's hand slide into his, and he gently helps her get to her feet.

It feels familiar to take care of her because, after all, this is how they started their friendship. Since then they have bumped into each other around town, and shared a drink at The Metro Court, and played baccarat for high stakes one night on The Haunted Star. But they aren't dating, and they can't fall in love.

He will never love again. Never, he tells himself this everyday- as if his mantra keeps Emily alive in some small way. He's speaking in his head to a ghost that is long gone now. She's somewhere loving him...somewhere but no longer by his side anymore. Nikolas tries to accept this and each day that passes he thinks maybe he is, just a fraction, closer to be healed. And other times he is convinced he never will be whole again.

Though he is sure he can not love, he does feel...he feels anger that Claudia has been hurt by some nameless, faceless monster of a man, and he feels longing to ease her pain, he feels her hopelessness and wants to replace it with hope. Maybe one day he will find a way to do that. For tonight it is her body that needs his attention.

In the bathroom, Claudia knots her eyebrows together and watches him, her eyes filled with a mixture of suspicion and trust. It's the oddest combination, but it's her. She is desperate to be perceived as possessing innumerable reserves of strength. But, Nikolas knows all too well, no one is that strong.

Everyone falls down. Everyone breaks sometimes. He has before. He will again. Claudia has and she will again. Only she will not admit it when it happens and will think that means it never did.

He starts the water to fill the tub. Nikolas opens the complimentary shampoo and empties it into the water. "I can help you undress...or look away...whichever makes you more comfortable."

"I ain't shy."

Nikolas notices she visibly swallows right after saying this, a small tell. He nearly smiles when he learns she has one, and finds himself looking for it to happen again after that. Gently he eases off her leather jacket. He walks into the other room and places it on the back of a chair. When he comes back she is sitting down, trying to take off her boots. Her skin is flushed and she grunts in pain. He kneels and replaces her hands with his own, gently tugging off each shoe. Standing up, he bites his lip right before his hands skim the bottom of her shirt.

"I can..." she says but as soon as tries Claudia shudders in pain and lets out a low curse.

Nikolas waits for her to recover, and look up at him. "I think you know by now you can trust me...so trust me, Claudia. Trust me to help you."

He is careful as he attempts to lift her shirt off but when a tear streams down her face, Nikolas knows that he is failing her. He turns off the water, and then heads out into the bedroom and calls down to the front desk. They bring a pair of scissors. He cuts the shirt off of her, and tosses the stained rag into the trash. Claudia sits before him in a bra and jeans. He can now see just how battered her body is. There are discolored bruises of different shades on her shoulders, and arms and stomach. Seeing how she's hurt sends a cold rage shimmering through him, but he pushes it back. Right now he needs to ease her discomfit, not think about what seeing her like this is doing to himself.

She pops opens the button on her jeans. His hands move to her thighs and tugs them downward, revealing lacy red boy shorts. Claudia stands, while he is still kneeling, and suddenly his face is even with her stomach. It raises the intimacy level, and Nikolas has to force himself to keep his mind on the task at hand.

She's slightly shivering when he steps behind her and unlatches her bra. Her hands move up to catch the front of it, holding it against her for a moment.

Close to her ear, he whispers "If you think you can manage alone I'll leave now."

"No," she breathes out quickly. "You can stay. Its okay." Claudia lets the bra fall to the ground. Her eyes flutter close when his hands grasp her panties.

Trust. It's a funny thing. How it grows out of thin air. How it changes everything. Nikolas sees her trust the same way he sees precious jewels- rare and magnificent.

Slowly, he gets her into the bath and her gorgeous, though injured, body slides beneath the bubbles. She leans her head back and lets out a long breath. "This feels good."

He finds a fresh wash cloth and wets it, then lifts her hand and wipes away faint traces of blood.

"What happened tonight?"

"What always happens. Someone tried to kill me. No big deal."

"That isn't something to be cavalier about."

"I deserved it. Its part of the lifestyle I live."

"No...no, Claudia, no one deserves something like this."

"That's where you are wrong, Nikolas. Some people do. I know those people. I am one of those people.

"So that's it? You shoot them and they shoot you? You kill them and you wait for them to kill you? Is that really all you want for your life?"

"Its not about what I want. Its about what I can have."

"You can have it all!"

Her eyes met his and hold. "Oh yeah? Whose gonna give it to me? You? Cause if I have to go out and get it for myself. Then this," she touched a cut on her face "is how I'm gonna do it."

He shakes his head and looks down. "It's a waste of a beautiful life."

After a moment, she says "The only beautiful person I see in this room is you."

His hand dips into the water and then moves up to run through her hair, she exhales and then leans her face into his caress. He wonders if she has ever done that before with anyone else...leaned on them for just a moment and knew she was completely safe.

XXXXXXXXXX

Later Claudia is wrapped in a white robe and laying on the bed. Nikolas called Liz and she came over to check on Claudia, leaving the kids with her grandmother.

When Liz leaves, Claudia takes some pills to kill some of the pain and make her sleep. She says "I'll be good as new in the morning...or in a few mornings from now. Whatever."

He picks up his suit jacket. "I'll let you rest."

"You're leaving?" her tone is startled, and she half rises out of bed.

"I wouldn't want to impose on you, Claudia, and hover around as you try to sleep."

"Only you would call it imposing on me when you're helping me out. But that's cool...I don't want to keep you from your kid."

"Spencer is fine. He has his nanny, if he requires anything in the middle of the night."

"Still you should go. See you around, Prince."

"Would you...would you like me to stay?"

"Nah. I can handle it."

I can handle it. I can handle it. I can handle it. Nikolas realizes this must be her mantra, like his is I will never love again. Repeat ten times every day when you wake up and every night before you go to bed, and all day long when anyone asks how you are doing or what is the weather, and then maybe...just maybe...hopefully...the words will become true and you will be okay again- that seemed to be the theory they were both working off of. She would handle everything, and not die in a useless mob war. And he would never love again, and not lose his very soul when the person he counted on most disappears.

"You can handle it. Yes, we've established that," Nikolas says "Still, for safety sake, I better stay. You could have a concussion. We better not risk it."

She smiles, ruefully, and inches over to make room for him. Once he has taken off his shoes is settled next to her on the bed, sitting up while she is curled on her side facing him, she says "Everything hurts, Nikolas."

"I know...I know it does." He slides down so that he is on his side. "Close your eyes."

"For what?"

"Do you have to be so suspicious?"

"Can't help it. Its just my nature."

He whispers "Close your eyes, Claudia."

This time she does, but jokes "Gonna tell me a bed time story?" She tries to laugh and then says "Ouch," and touches her ribs. Still her eyes stay closed.

Nikolas just stares at her for a minute. The lines of her cheeks, the fullness of her lips, the way her hair is wild now because it got wet. Then he leans forward, and as soft as a butterfly wings flapping, he kisses the bruise on her jaw. Then the one on her temple, on her cheek, on her throat. He adjusts his body so he can lean over and kiss the cuts on her hand, lifting each one and bringing it to his mouth.

These kisses are not full of lust, or hunger, or need to taste her and quench his own desires. They are gifts, his way of trying to start a healing process in this torn apart woman who lays next to him. Someone who he shouldn't care about, knowing all he does, someone who he shouldn't understand, but he does understand her all the same.

Nikolas lays back down beside her, watching her again, and not planning to take things any further. But Claudia, with her eyes still close, undoes the belt for her robe. His eyes brush over her exposed skin- seeing beauty and seeing pain. His gut clenches at the sight. Ever so tenderly he lays kisses on the bruises over her mid-section, never lingering long at each one, just brushing his lips over the spot where she was violated and moving on. One of her hands come up to tangle in his hair, and she lets out a small moan...because every movement she makes, he can tell, adds to her pain and yet she wants to touch him enough to endure it.

When he glances up, her eyes are open and they met his. He slides up next to her. He would like to be able to hold her in his arms, to give her that small measure of comfort, but he is afraid it would hurt her to be held right now. So he instead intertwines their fingers.

She asks "Why are you so good to me? Don't you know what I am?"

"What are you, Claudia?"

"I'm the darkest woman you are ever going to meet. There's nothing light inside of me. There's nothing to like."

"Perhaps I like the dark side."

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Eventually Claudia falls asleep. Nikolas stays up, watching her and the clock, and brooding over the situation Claudia was in earlier that night. Its not right that she is in this crazy mob life and that she's constantly at risk the way she is.

Yet he can't tell her how to conduct her life. All he can do is be her friend.

He doesn't have more to offer right now. And if he did, it wouldn't make much sense to offer to share his life with her. To bring his son closer to the mob world than he already was by having Sonny for an Uncle and Sonny's child for a cousin.

He knows all that. Still having that knowledge does not change the fierce protectiveness that wells up inside of him when he looks at her asleep next to him in bed. He wonders if she might like to see Greece. Maybe if they went away for a while then whatever was going on with the mob would die down.

Nikolas can't be sure if he is only making excuses to spend time with her or if he's acting in pure friendship, because everything when it comes to how he feels about Claudia is a twisted maze through his head and his heart that he can't quite follow yet, but his idea makes sense to him. He'll suggest the trip in the morning.

For tonight, he'll just watch her as she sleeps, her black hair fanned onto the pillow and the moonlight falling over her tanned skin. Emotions he doesn't want to acknowledge start to bubble up in him, and the panic of feeling so much, makes him think:

If I ever fall in love again, it won't be with her.

Somewhere in the distance, on that hot August night, a voice catches on a breeze and carries its way right into that room; Nikolas is sure he hears Emily saying Too late.

THE END