Chapter 37

Like Hannibal Lecter

Silence. It suddenly felt like time would have stopped. That didn't last long. Seraphine startled when the loud banging started. Apparently Kol had decided to take his anger out of the walls. Not the best idea since they were in the basement. The whole house could collapse. She looked at Klaus but he seemed to be completely frozen. There was a mix of disbelief, confusion and maybe even desperation on his face. Apparently he tried to open his mouth but nothing came out. Well, someone had to do something. Running like hell sounded like the best idea but she was aware that she wouldn't get far. She took a deep breath and approach Kol, who was making holes in the walls very fast, she could barely even see his fist moving. Seraphine forced herself not to look at the bodies when she walked pass them.

"Master?" she said cautiously. "Kol?"

He didn't seem to hear her. She swallowed and moved closer, although she was very much aware that he could easily kill her. Probably not intentionally, but that didn't really matter.

"Kol?"

His face was completely callous when he kept hitting the wall.

"Hey! Do you think that collapsing the whole building on us will help?"

Surprisingly her words actually made him stop. His fists were still clenched and he was gritting his teeth. Judging by his expression, he was ready to kill the entire population of this city, maybe even the whole continent. Only a crazy person would have tried to touch him. Well, since she was a crazy person… She forced herself to stay calm and gently touched his shoulder. He didn't say anything but he didn't throw her against the wall either, so she continued stroking his arm and back until he started to relax.

"There should be some brandy in Mrs. Standish's apartment," she said softly.

"Good brandy?" he asked without looking at her.

"I don't know but she seemed to like it. She sometimes offered me a drink after the store was closed."

He zoomed upstarts without saying anything else. Ok, one down, one to go. Seraphine turned to Klaus who was standing still like a statue. She stepped in front of him and touched his cheek.

"Klaus?"

There was no reaction. For heavens sake…

"Klaus!"

Nothing. She pressed her lips together and slapped him. Apparently that did the trick.

"What…"

"Sorry, but I had to do something."

He stared at her for a moment before looking at the bodies and finally the text. Angry didn't even begin to describe his expression. Still the scariest part was his smile.

"When I find the person who did this, I'm going to make it my mission to break my old record," he said sounding almost cheerful. For some reason she doubted that he was talking about a hugging or pie eating record.

"I'm sure we can work this out," she muttered.

He smiled and ran his thumb along the line of her lips. Since the gesture wasn't as intrusive as usually, (and he kind of looked like Hannibal Lecter or something) she touched his shoulder calmingly. He wrapped his arms tightly around her, like he would be drowning and she was a life-buoy.

"It's ok", she muttered and tapped his back. It was truly amusing that at the moment she seemed to be the only sane one here.

Suddenly he lifted her into his arms and started to carry her upstairs. Apparently Kol had found the brandy. He was sitting on the counter drinking it with long gulps.

"Give her to me", he said handing the bottle to Klaus.

What did they think that she was, a stress ball? They made the swap without saying a word. Kol wrapped his arms around her and snuggled his face in her hair. She wasn't very pleased but this probably wasn't the best time to bring that up so she settled for huffing and tapping his back. Thankfully they both seemed calmer now, more or less.

"So, the witches are dead then", Kol stated.

"Yep," Klaus replied and drank the rest of the brandy. "It seems that we need a new plan."

...

This was a nightmare. Klaus wasn't sure how much he had drank but a human would have probably died on alcohol poisoning by now. He had talked to Clarice and Elijah but right now there was nothing to do except wait. The hotel suite felt way too small but there was no chance he was going anywhere. Seraphine was sitting on a couch eating her dinner. Kol seemed to be standing next to a window with his bottle. He hadn't spoken much since they had left from the bookstore. There had to be another way to break the binding. He had somehow thought that finding Kayla would be easy. Well, technically it had been easy.

The problem was that obviously someone else knew about all of this. He had tried to think over and over again but he couldn't figure out who would be stupid enough to make an enemy out of him and Kol. Only an extremely stupid person would do that. Or someone who held some major grudge… Well that didn't narrow it down much, there had to be a whole platoon of people who didn't exactly like them. The question was how did that person know about the binding? He would definitely get to the bottom of this… He didn't have time to finish his thought when Seraphine coughed. He and Kol were next to her in a fraction of a second.

"I'm fine, I'm fine," she muttered. Kol looked like a nervous wreck and Klaus imagined that he himself didn't look much better. Apparently she had lost her appetite so she picked up her soda.

"Can you ask who killed them?" Kol suddenly asked.

Seraphine looked at him.

"I…I can try but they just died a violent death so it's likely that they are very confused right now, I don't think that they can…"

"How long will it take?" Kol interrupted her.

"I'm not sure", she replied. "Every spirit is different…"

"I bet that they want their killer to suffer and I'm more than happy to arrange that."

"No, I'm going to do that," Klaus said. "And I'm going to take my time."

"I'm not going to let you have all the fun; I have some great tactics I want to try."

Klaus rolled his eyes.

"Fine, we'll do the torturing together but I want to kill the bastard."

"Why do you get to kill him? I want to kill someone too!"

"And you think that I don't?" Klaus snapped. "Right now I want nothing more than shred someone into pieces!"

Kol threw his bottle against the wall.

"Good idea! Let's go and kill someone!"

Klaus didn't have time to reply when Seraphine cleared her throat.

"Or we could watch a movie", she said cautiously.

Kol snorted.

"Darling, if I have to watch one more chick flick I'm definitely going to kill someone."

She huffed and stood up.

"Have I ever told you that I would like that kind of movies?"

He looked surprised.

"What?"

"Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean that I would like chick flicks."

"Why the hell did you make me watch three of them then?"

She rolled her eyes.

"I didn't choose those movies, you did. Runaway bride? Who the hell wants to watch that?"

Klaus looked at his brother and started to laugh.

"Shut up," Kol snapped. "What kind of movies do you like then?"

"Historical, adventure, fantasy, documentaries."

"Hmm, that doesn't sound so bad."

She looked at both of them.

"Maybe you can reschedule your… other plans?"

"Sure", Klaus heard himself saying. Seriously? A movie? But then again there wasn't much they could do tonight anyway. Hopefully they would have more information by tomorrow. She gave him a smile and sat onto the couch. Her presence was just what he needed right now, somehow she soothed him. Perhaps that should have worried him but right now he didn't care. What a damn mess.