Chapter 10.

"What's that?!" Klaus asked his female hybrid, Danielle, as she came in his room, with a clothes' basket full of…pink? garments.

"There seem to have been…an accident in the laundry room, a red cloth was put with the white things and…this is the result."

"An accident?" Klaus closed his eyes and swore under his breath. "…Where is she?"

"In the library." Danielle answered, knowing exactly about who he was asking.

He grabbed all the clothes from the basket in one swoop and started to leave, then turned to look at the hybrid again. "My bathroom?...Is it still okay? The other rooms checked too?"

"I did a sweep half an hour ago, everything is in order…I'll check again later." He could swear there was a hint of a smile on her face.

He really hadn't found anything remotely funny about stepping into his room and feeling his very expensive shoes wading in an inch of water which in one quick glance he could see rushing out from under his bathroom door. He had roared Caroline's name so loud, all the hybrids had come out from wherever they were, thinking she was in danger.

He shook his head again as he remembered her calmly coming out of her bedroom and all wide eyed had tried to feign ignorance as to what was happening. She sucked at lying!

He sighed looking at all the clothes in his arms, "See that all this stuff is replaced with new ones."

"Will do." Danielle answered with a nod.

Taking the stairs, and turning to the right side once he was down, he walked lightly towards the large doors which opened to the library.

He opened the door softly, and immediately saw her leg poking out resting on a leather chair's arm.

In four swift steps he was next to her and dumped all the clothes in his arms atop her head.

"So this is where you've been hiding?" Klaus asked her in a clipped tone. "You really find this funny?" He asked the moment her head popped out from under the fresh garments.

He watched as her teeth dug in her lower lip to stop a smile from spreading.

"I hope you weren't crazy enough to touch any of Rebekah's clothes cause I really don't think I would be able to save your hair this time."

"My hair?!" Caroline asked, all fun gone from her face.

"Yes," Klaus replied, "she did a list of things she could do to you without hurting me and shaving your head was number one on the list."

Her hand went up to touch her hair, a very worried expression on her face.

Good, so he can still scare her.

"You know what happened to the hybrid who was supposed to take care of this?"

Her mouth opened in horror. "Oh my God you...killed them?...Oh my..."

"No!" He rejected her idea with anger. "She now has to go around buying me new stuff...so as you can see, it was of no inconvenience to me...just as it was no inconvenience to me that you left the water running in my bathroom yesterday, flooding my room. It was just all extra work for the hybrids."

Her lips pouted in a half sad, half angry look.

"You've been here less than a week and they already hate your guts." It wasn't necessarily true. No one of them would dare complain to him. But she didn't know that.

She shook her head slowly. "No, they don't. They're always very nice to me."

"Simply because those are my orders." Klaus replied. "Personally, they hate the stupid pranks you keep pulling...at their expenses!"

Her lips pouted out even more and she lowered her eyes so she didn't see the little smile that tugged at the corner of his lips. Making her feel guilty would do the trick, he thought.

Her eyes went up to meet his again. "If it's just at their expenses, why did you shout your head off at me for ten minutes yesterday?" She wanted to know.

She was smart. He slowly tied his arms on his chest. "Because you actually had the audacity to pretend it hadn't been you! With your innocent open gaze...as if I would ever believe those pretty eyes of yours."

Again her eyes went downward. Another thing he noticed about her. She got nervous when she couldn't tell if he was flirting with her or not. And most of the time he was. He couldn't help himself.

"I really didn't believe you would stay away from your room for so long."

"Liar. And a lousy one at that!"

Her pout turned angry and she gave up any pretense she felt guilty about it.

He smiled, changing the subject. "You know, love, if you want to be invited in my room, you just have to ask."

She rolled her eyes heavily. "No. Thank you."

Klaus smile widened. "Are you sure?" He insisted, "I mean...first you leave me that alarm with that beautiful song to wake up to...how did the lyrics go?...something about loving me for...a thousand years..."

The song hadn't even been that loud, she obviously had made some mistake while preparing that alarm and he had woken up to a feminine voice singing this love song. He had been woken up in worse ways he had thought as he had put his arms behind his head and went on to listen to the song before switching it off and going back to sleep with a smile on his lips.

"And then you came back to...prepare me a bath? I mean what's a man to think?" He continued with a knowing soft laugh.

"Shut up!" Caroline growled then looking at the clothes still randomly thrown on her went on, "What need did you have for new clothes anyway? What's wrong with you wearing this?" She asked him showing him a pink smudged white shirt. Then picking up a pair of pink boxers, threw them at him. "Or even this?"

He caught them and dropped them on one of the sofas. "And you do it again! Is this a roundabout way to tell me you want to see me in them?"

She threw the rest of the clothes off her lap with anger. "As if."

The book that had been resting on her legs fell on the carpet with the clothes. "What are you reading?" He asked, glancing at the hard, yellowed cover, "Jane Eyre...You never read this before?"

"Of course I have...I just wanted something familiar."

What the hell did that mean? He thought looking at her, confused.

She must have noticed his bafflement cause with a little sigh she explained herself. "I miss my home, okay, my mom...and my room. Jane Eyre is a book I've had in my room since I can remember so...having it with me now feels good...familiar. Well, of course mine isn't a first edition...but still...I bet you don't even know what I'm talking about."

He didn't. "I thought your taste in reading would be something less...gothic...more romantic." He said instead.

"You don't think Jane Eyre is romantic?"

His eye brows rose high at her exclamation. "What exactly is romantic? The crazy wife locked in the attic? Or the fact that Rochester took advantage of a young naive girl."

Caroline's mouth dropped open. "He fell in love with her!" She argued hotly. "He thought he would never find happiness...and yet he found it with the most unsuspected person, he wanted to marry her."

Klaus snorted rudely at her. "But he already was...to a crazy woman! And he only asked Jane to marry him cause he knew she would never agree to be his mistress."

"No! He wanted to be with her forever, whatever the cost...and her with him."

"And yet the moment he revealed his biggest secret to her...she left him."

"She came back."

"Months later. To find him broken."

"But their love still intact."

"Ohh," He shook his head. He should have known. "So it's not the romance...it's the unrealistic happy ending you like."

"Unrealistic?...Why?" Caroline turned haughty eyes on him. "I'll let you know, that while you may not know much about it, true love exists."

He rolled his eyes heavily. "No, it doesn't. Not for real, not forever."

His words made her pause and she looked directly at him for a long, heavy moment before quietly declaring. "I don't believe you."

"What is it you don't believe?" He asked with a confused frown.

"This...this nonsense you're pulling out of not believing in love...you once talked to me about art, music, all the beautiful things in this world that made it worth living in it, for centuries... you couldn't possibly appreciate those things if you didn't love them."

She still remembered the things he told her on her birthday night…just like he did.

"But that's not the kind of love we were talking about." He said not letting her see that she had surprised him with her words.

"Love is love, in any kind or form." She retorted.

She sounds like someone else I know. He thought. "You remind me of Elijah...he's always...praising the good to be found in love."

That seemed to make her proud because she raised her chin. "He's the smart one then."

"Smart?...he's still alone after all this time. What does that tell you?" Klaus asked with a shake of his head.

"No. What does it tell you?" She turned his question on him. "If after all these centuries, he hasn't given up, it means he knows that love is worth searching for, waiting for..."

He snorted and shook his head harder.

"What do you think of love?" Caroline asked him in a quiet voice.

"What I always tell Elijah, that love is weakness." He replied in a flat tone of someone who had recited those words many, many times over the centuries.

Her eyes seemed to soften as she looked at him and then with a sad, little shake of her head said. "That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard...love is the opposite of weakness, love makes you strong, makes you capable of doing anything..."

With a start he looked up. "Oh look," He pointed at nothing, "there's a rainbow over your head with a unicorn flying over it."

She got up from the chair and started walking away. "Why do I even bother?"

Klaus picked up the book from the floor. "Wait…It's yours, take it." He said offering it to her.

"No."

He frowned. "Why not?"

"Cause like I already said that's a first edition...an expensive first edition."

He took one step closer, still offering her the book as he said. "Which will certainly be more appreciated by you, then anyone else in this house."

"No." She refused again after giving the book a long wistful look.

He sighed because he could tell she wished for it. "Then keep it in your room...for something...familiar wasn't it?...You can leave it behind when you return home."

Her hand went for the book as she gave him a strange smile.

"What are you smiling about?"

"What you..." She stopped and gave him a confused look like she was unable to put in words what she was thinking.

"Well?" He asked curiously but she just shook her head.

"Nothing." She replied before taking the book and held it to her. "And thank you.' She said softly before leaving the room.

Klaus kept staring at the closed door, deep in thought. Was he wrong or was this the first conversation they had since she's been in the house that hadn't ended up with them screaming at each other? It had been a long week but it seemed like they were finally making some progress.

Something familiar. What a strange concept. He had been on this earth for a thousand years and he didn't believe he possessed anything that gave him such a feeling. He had collected hundreds of things along the years, jewels, paintings, clothes, even buildings…but something that gave him…comfort? By having it? No.

He seated himself in her place and the faintest whiff of her minty shampoo or some other product she used hit his nostrils. Bonnie must have packed it for her with the rest of her things, because he smelled it everywhere. It seemed to linger in the air even after she left a room. Maybe not even mint exactly, it could be eucalyptus…with a hint of apple. He took a deep breath and then shook his head. He couldn't understand why it stood out so much. Maybe it was because smelling it in her hair was one of the last lucid memories he had before the fever had overtaken him. Every time he smelt it, he was back in that moment, Caroline sleeping with her head on his shoulder, her hand on his chest.

Many of the remaining long hours in that cottage stayed just out of reach of his memory in his foggy mind.

"The best one of the Michaelson family is home." His younger brother, Kol, suddenly strode in the library with his usual flare.

"It's been almost a week. Where the bloody hell, have you been?" Klaus rose from the chair to glare at him.

"And it's good to see you too, brother."

His older brother huffed loudly. "I asked you a question!"

"One doesn't simply leave everything they are doing because you call." Kol answered with a shrug.

"Yes you do," Klaus rebutted, "If your family is in danger, you quit what you're doing and just come home."

"You're still here I see and I presume also Rebekah so…" Kol raised one eye brow at him as he took in the clothes scattered on the floor. "What have you been doing? Trying your hand at laundry…and failing…"

Klaus shook his head. "I have been trying to find who this werewolf clan is but no success till now. They seem to have been all recently created…except the leader but still, no leads there yet either."

"What about the witch?" The younger original asked.

"She's not in Mystic Falls…I'm keeping tabs on the whole group but there has been no sign of a witch with them, which is why I needed you here…you're the one with the most connections when it comes to witches."

Kol nodded at that. "And I will do my best to find out who she is."

"Are you sure you didn't give your blood to one of your friends?" Klaus stress on the last word was intentional.

"I refuse to answer that question again, I am not an idiot."

Klaus raised his eye brows but chose not to remark on his brother's acclamation. "Let's go in my study, I have pictures there of all the members of the clan and I want to know where you'll be going and who will you be asking…"

"Yes, yes, yes." Kol interrupted him, " We can do all that later, now I want to go catch up with my favorite sister…and then have dinner cause I'm famished…not to say that I'm looking forward to seeing that pretty blond you're keeping in this house again."

"Why?!"

But Kol had already left the room.