Chapter 28

Long after Mom went to bed I stayed with Monroe in the living room. I rested my head in his lap as we talked for hours about anything and everything to keep me distracted. Monroe's phone rang loudly in his pocket and we both jumped.

"Isn't it a little late to be calling?" Monroe asked as he answered the phone. It had to be Nick. It was after three in the morning here, but in Portland it was only midnight. "Well, I would, but I'm not at home," he continued. "Umm, Kentucky…" Monroe briefly went into the events of the last few days while I got up to stretch.

Ignoring the conversation, I straightened the coffee table. It was one thing to go through it, but I didn't need to hear it retold again.

"Nick gives his condolences," Monroe said to me as I finished straightening. Well, at least Nick had the courtesy to say that. Monroe sat silently as he listened to Nick for a moment. "Oh, so we've got a little deutsche schwierigkeit, do we?"

I sat back down. Whatever he'd said was German, but I wasn't catching this one.

Monroe noticed my look and held his hand over the phone. "German difficulty." He winked at me. Was it an oxymoron that I had difficulty with the word 'difficulty'? I was definitely sleepy.

I listened to Monroe's side of the conversation some more, not caring if I was being nosey. Nick wanted to e-mail some photocopies of German text for Monroe to translate since he needed help. I motioned for Monroe to follow me to the computer room.

"Yeah, man… send them over, and I'll call you back in a minute," he told Nick as we both sat down in front of the computer. I booted it up and let Monroe log into his e-mail. Actually, I was impressed the man had e-mail.

Nick was fast and the e-mail was already there with a few cell phone photo attachments. As the first photo loaded, it looked like a handwritten book. Sketches of Wesen and lots of German I couldn't pronounce was written throughout. The word 'Schakal' stood out, and I was familiar with that type of Wesen. I'd never saw one before, but Chloe had it in her notebooks.

"Dude, this isn't just something to translate. If I'm correct… that looks like an actual Grimm book." Monroe smiled wide as he looked at the photo. "Oh, wow. We're hitting the big time here!" He called Nick back and put him on speaker phone. I closed the computer room door.

"Hey, Nick. Renée is sitting in on this. Are you okay with that, man?"

"Yeah, that's fine," Nick replied. "The more help the better, I suppose."

"Oh, this is high German," Monroe said as he read over the text. "Auf dem Weg von München nach Augsburg stieß ich auf ein kleines feuer..." He continued to read the rest of the German aloud effortlessly. There went his sexy brain again. Pure brilliance. I was too fatigued to translate anything, but 'from Munich to Augsburg.'

"And that means…?" Nick asked from the speaker phone.

"On the way from Munich to Augsburg, I came across a small fire a little ways into the woods. With as much stealth as possible, I stumbled upon two Wesen who were feasting on a piece of raw meat. While I was sneaking away, I saw how their facial features suddenly became wild, and I immediately recognized them as Schakaln. But as I gradually reached them, they noticed me and fled."

While he was reading, I went to the next photo of two Schakaln eating human flesh. Great, there were visuals.

"Oh, look out, they ate a baby," Monroe said, scrunching his nose. "That's rude."

"At least they weren't doing it in public," I commented to Monroe, and he grinned.

"So what happened?" Nick asked sharply. Apparently we were on Grimm company time.

"Okay, okay, here we go. So he caught up with the Schakal and…" Monroe paused. "Indem er eine Axt niedergeschlagen hat," Monroe continued. "So, basically he was defeated using an ax. Of course he was. You guys are really into chopping off heads, aren't ya?" Monroe shook his own head. How many heads had my ancestors chopped off in their day? Well, if I was actually a Grimm. It wasn't proven yet.

"So, is there anything in the text that tells me what I'm up against with these Schakals?" Nick asked, sounding a little annoyed. I wanted to correct his pronunciation, but it wasn't my place.

"Aside from being baby-eating badasses? What more do you need, man?" Monroe looked over at me and I agreed. These Wesen were not the kind you had over for a barbeque.

"You can't trust Schakaln, Nick." I pointed to a section of German below one of the photos, translating better this time.

"How do you know that?" Nick asked incredulously.

"Dude, she's reading it." Monroe turned to me with a smile. "And very well, I might add." He went back to the computer screen. "Yeah, it says here, 'You can never, for any reason, trust a Schakal.' Pretty straight-forward, if you ask me."

"Okay. So, look at the photos about Steinadlers," Nick said as we pulled up the next few photos. He didn't seem to get plurals in German at all. "What can you tell me about them?" There were various pictures of Steinadler in uniform and notes of war dates from the Franco-Prussian War to the Battle of Williamsburg labeled beneath them.

"Interesting," Monroe said, looking through the photos. "Steinadler seem to be involved in the military. These guys are noble and heroic Wesen," he told Nick. "And apparently they have very large… sausages?" Monroe leaned up close to the screen to read the text again. "I don't think I'm translating that correctly." He scratched his head, squinting at the words.

"I think it means…" I ran my hand up the inseam of Monroe's thigh. Sometimes Monroe needed a hand with things. I was really sleepy.

"Oh!" he blurted out. "Okay, well Steinadler have big…"

"They have big beaks," I said to Nick, interrupting Monroe.

Monroe flashed a grin my way, his eyes sparked red for a moment. He went back to the computer screen. "Anyway, when dealing with a Steinadler, it's hard to tell whose side they're on."

"So, they can't be trusted either?" Nick asked.

"Not exactly. It's more like… trust your gut," Monroe replied as he gestured his hands toward his stomach. "You know, what really doesn't add up is a Steinadler with a Schakal. They're, like, two sides of the same coin." That was a pretty good analogy. These Wesen were definitely on opposite sides. My curiosity was brimming. How did these two Wesen relate to whatever Nick was working on?

"Funny you should mention coins," Nick replied. "There was a robbery at a jewelry store that involved three rare coins. One side has a swastika, the other a lion's head. You know anything about coins, Monroe?"

"Coins? No, that's not my thing." Monroe shook his head. "But stamps, however…"

"Just dealing with coins here," Nick interjected. A swastika and a lion's head. Where had I seen that before?

"My dad was a big coin collector," I said. "What you're describing sounds familiar. Let me check something, and I'll be right back." My dad had tons of books on rare coins. Some books dated back to the sixteenth century. He was quite the numismatist.

I walked into my dad's office and took a deep breath in; it still smelled like him in here. What would Mom do with all of these treasures? No time to worry about that now. I had a book in mind. When I was younger I'd read his books over and over, enjoying the photos of all the coins. I never got into collecting myself, but I loved the stories my dad would tell about his finds.

Scanning one of the shelves along the far wall, I chose an old, blue book with the words Coins of Ancient Greece written in faded gold letters on the spine. I opened the cover page where it read 'Published in 1803.' While my memory was nowhere near photographic, it was great when it came to things like this.

I went through the book, carefully sifting through the pages until I found what I was looking for. 'The Myth of the Coins of Zakynthos' the chapter read at the top. Didn't all the real things start with the word 'myth'? Drawn out on the page was the obverse lion's head, then beside it the reverse bearing the swastika symbol. My memory had served me well, and I smiled at my own find.

I hurried back to the computer room, book in hand.

"Does the Island of Zakynthos sound familiar?" I asked Nick through the phone as I sat back down and laid the book on the desk so Monroe could see.

"Zakynthos. Yes!" Nick said, sounding excited. "The guy I had in for questioning mentioned Zakynthos in Greece."

I relayed the info about the myth of these coins and how they had originated in Greece, mined from the Zakynthos Island on the Ionian Sea. The coins claimed to give great power to whoever possessed them and contained dangerously high levels of arsenic and mercury on top of the gold they were made from. These coins had been passed down from the Romans to Augustus to Nero. Their last known origin was sometime around the Han Dynasty in China.

"Does it mention Hitler?" Nick asked.

"Not in this book," I replied. "It was published in the 1800s before Adolf's time."

"What does Hitler have to do with the coins?" Monroe asked.

"This guy I was questioning said the coins were found in the Third Reich," Nick replied.

"Well, if ever there was a man who held great power, Hitler would be it," I said while Googling for photos of Hitler. Puzzles were my kind of thing, and this one was intriguing. I came across a photo that added more to solving this puzzle. "Oh, now this is interesting." I pointed at the photo. "Look at his buttons, Monroe."

"Dude, I think you're on to something," Monroe said to me as he leaned closer to the screen. Maybe this Grimm stuff was in my blood after all.

"What did she find?" Nick asked, sounding anxious.

"Looks like Hitler thought your coins were a fashion accessory, man." Monroe chuckled. The coins were attached to Hitler's uniform like buttons.

"Check your e-mail," I replied, hitting 'send' after attaching the photo.

"Hang on. It's through my phone." There was a shuffling sound over the speaker for a few moments. "That's the coins!" Nick said all at once.

I muted the phone a moment. "What was Hitler?" I asked Monroe. I was starting to get a feeling that Augustus, Nero, and even Hitler weren't human. These coins may have fallen into Wesen hands, but I had a suspicion they always had.

"An evil dude with bad taste in facial hair, if you ask me," Monroe responded, scratching the beard on his chin for effect.

"No, Monroe, what was he?" I inquired, double checking the phone to make sure the mute was still on. "What kind of Wesen?"

"Dude, I don't know. I've heard, you know, he could've been, but you hear lots of things like that. Every famous or infamous person is Wesen according to somebody. It's hard to tell unless you see it for yourself," he replied, shrugging. I hadn't seen many videos of Hitler, but the ones I'd seen had no indication of even a twitch let alone a woge that I could recall. You couldn't tell from a photo if someone was Wesen, either. Something inside me kept bringing me to this conclusion. If only I could go to the library or someplace with more videos of Hitler to find out.

"Are you guys still there?" Nick asked.

I pressed the mute button. "Yeah, just a second." Putting it back on mute, I said to Monroe, "I think these coins are always being sought after by Wesen. Suggest the Hitler idea to Nick and see what he says." I took the phone back off mute.

Monroe gave me a 'what now' look with his wide eyes. I motioned to him to start talking.

"So, Nick… Okay, what if, let's say hypothetically speaking here, Hitler wasn't... you know, human," he began and his eyes remained wide.

"Are you telling me Hitler was Wesen, Monroe?" Nick exclaimed. "What kind?"

"No, dude, I don't know if he was or wasn't, but what if he was? What if these coins have been passed around the Wesen world all along, not just recently?"

"That's brilliant, Monroe! I'm going to see what I can find out. Thanks!" Nick replied. "Renée, thank you, too. I'm really sorry to hear about your dad's accident," he added, somberly.

"I appreciate that, Nick," I said.

"I lost my parents due to a car accident when I was twelve," said Nick softly. "This is never easy no matter how old you are."

"I'm sorry to hear about your parents, Nick." Well, that was something I wasn't aware of. But there were lots of things about Nick I didn't know. "I'm doing what I can to cope."

"So, umm, you need anything else translated?" Monroe asked, drumming his fingers on the computer desk.

"No, that's all I need right now," Nick responded. "Thanks to both of you, again."

"Bis später, alligator," Monroe said.

"Bis später," Nick replied and hung up.

"Brilliant, huh?" Monroe scoffed. "I'm lucky if I get a 'thank you' much less..." Monroe muttered aloud.

"Oh, hush! You are brilliant!" I replied and gave him a kiss. "And, besides, he thinks it was all you, anyway, so maybe he'll start to respect you more."

"Not likely, but thanks." Exhaustion was trying to take over, but my mind was spinning this puzzle around. I wanted to call Chloe. She would've loved this! A real Grimm book! All this had made our notebooks look like child's play. It's a shame she wouldn't have been able to handle sitting next to Monroe for this long, even with something this amazing to research. And how would I have explained her to Nick and vice-versa? Too many secrets.

I took the book back to my dad's office and Monroe followed. His eyes wandered around as he entered the room, taking it all in.

"Wow… Dude, now this is a collection!" Monroe said in awe as he read over a few titles. He was rambling off books he knew about and was getting more excited as he went. I adored watching him like this. He looked like a kid at an amusement park, pulling out a few titles here and there. Monroe turned and spotted my dad's antique phonograph, made a little gasp, and discarded the books. He looked it over appreciatively and that childlike grin of his enveloped his face.

"Oh, dude. A Victor II!" Monroe practically squealed. "And it has the original black horn with a brass bell and everything. This is in stellar condition!" Monroe gave me a look that asked if he could touch it, and I gave a nod, smiling.

"It's either a 1904 or a... No, it's definitely a 1905." He flipped the switch, and Billy Murray began to softly play 'Waltz Me Around Again, Willie.' Monroe swayed his head to the century old music and closed his eyes slightly. I held in a few tears while listening to the song. My dad and I would dance to that when I was a kid.

"So, tell me about Mr. Victor," I said, as he opened his eyes and turned back toward me. "Or was that his first name?"

"Uh, there wasn't a Victor," Monroe replied, giving me a knowledgeable grin. "Eldridge Johnson founded the Victor Talking Machine Company back in 1901. Now there's controversy as to how the name originated, but most say Johnson thought his phonograph was such an improvement over the gramophone he considered it a scientific victory, hence 'Victor.'" Monroe sported that trademark smile of his, and I bit my lip at his sexy brain. He spouted off more info about Johnson and the Victor Company, all the while gesturing with his hands as Billy Murray played on.

As he was telling a story about an aunt who had a Victor V, I pulled him forward and kissed him deeply, grabbing his head in my hands.

He held me close, kissing me back. "What was that for?" he asked, looking a little bewildered as I let go. He let a small grin pass his lips once the shock wore off.

"Just because you're so sexy," I replied, grinning back. Sleepiness was as bad as drunkenness, and I was chatty.

"Umm, I'm not sexy at all," he responded doubtfully. "You seeing okay through those beautiful green eyes of yours?" Monroe wasn't a beauty queen, but he didn't realize how sexy his whole package was. That sexy brain of his did more for me than any pretty face out there. But it was more than that. His eyes, his voice, that contrast between his genuine smile and devilish grin, his humor, those sweaters, and even the plaid. I could go on and on. That man did things to me, and I was smitten. Not sexy at all? Oh, how humble you are, Mr. Monroe.

"Honey, you have volumes of sex appeal," I assured him. The crazy 'L' word tried to resurface, and it was all I could do to hold it in. "And don't ever discount your looks, because I'm rather fond of yours," I added.

"Volumes of sex appeal? Yeah, right!" He scoffed. "You, on the other hand, are sexy both inside and out." Monroe curled his arms around me and looked back into my eyes with his russet ones flickering brown and red.

We stayed in the office a few moments longer until my eyes settled on the empty, black leather chair to the right of Monroe. The realization that I'd never again see my dad in that chair behind the desk took hold of me, and I dabbed at my eyes.

"You okay?" Monroe asked, concerned.

"Yeah, I'm just tired. It's been a really long, taxing day. I've got to get some sleep." Nick's coins and Monroe's sexy brain had been good distractions, but that was over, and the harsh realities were coming back.

"Yeah, it's almost four in the morning. Geez," Monroe said, looking at his wide cuff, brown leather watch. I gave him another kiss. He held me a moment longer, looking like he wanted to say something more. "When are you going to tell Nick?" he finally asked, and I became deflated.

"When I'm ready to tell him," I replied. I was too wrung out to talk about this again.

Monroe sighed and kissed me on the forehead. "Get some sleep. I'll see you in the morning," he said.

I yawned just thinking about bed. "When do I get to see your stamp collection?' I asked, giving him a sleepy grin.

"When we get home you can see my One Penny Black stamp! Oh, you'll love it!" Monroe lit up when he said it. What the heck was a One Penny Black stamp? Monroe would definitely have to give me a lesson on stamps.

I walked back to the living room and was a bit unsteady. What an incredibly long and emotionally crazy day. My dad was gone. I walked up the stairs, dragging my feet as I went. I really needed more distractions.


A/N: So we go back into Grimm story mode. Monroe isn't in Portland, but Nick was still able to gain some insight into Steinadler and Schakaln. With Renée's help, Nick has some ideas about Hitler earlier than he did in the show.

If you go on to my profile I have a YouTube video there of an old phonograph playing "Waltz Me Around Again, Willie." - Bonus features. LOL!

Hope you're enjoying the story so far. We're not even half done with this story yet. Thanks for the comments. I'm almost to 100 comments, I wonder who will be my 100th?

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