Notes:
Finally a new update! Some of the details in this chapter are fuzzy, bear with me if they don't correspond with the show, but then again, this story is canon divergent, which means these details don't matter very much, lol. I apologise in advance for any grammatical errors, I haven't had time to write, let alone to proof read this rather long chapter. I hope you all enjoy. Hit me up with your reviews, they are appreciated.
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"There's been another decapitation," said Renard behind his desk in his office.
"So I hear," replied Nick casually, although feeling anything.
Despite his feeling toward Sean Renard, Nick didn't want to be a smartass considering the seriousness of the topic of conversation but he'd already been neck deep working this case when Renard suspended him over the little tussle with one of Sweet Robin's former Blutbad buddies. Nick barely touched the guy before Renard threw the book at him, "…To make an example of him." He'd crowed arrogantly towards Nick. Since then, the air between them had grown glacial to say the least.
The Captain had called Nick into the Precinct two weeks after he'd "instructed" him to take some time off and though Nick had obliged, that morning, he'd taken a detour before meeting up with his boss.
It was in connection to a promise he'd made to Adalind just before she left for Germany, that he'd reimburse her the money she'd given him for Nebosja's books. Nick had met with the man who had made an offer to take Nick's vacant land off his hands for a reasonable sum. It was less than he'd hoped but better than he'd expected for the wooded piece of ground. Adalind had tried to brush it off her offering, saying the money didn't matter, that she did for Kelly who was as much her son as his but he would have none of it. They ultimately settled on going 50/50 for the books. That morning, it looked as though he'd make good on that promise and was feeling somewhat chirpy entering the Captain's office, Kelly, nestled soundly in the crook of his arm.
Renard shot him a foul look for his nonchalant response and the fact that he didn't come alone, which Nick easily ignored. With Adalind still away, Kelly never left his side. He knew he could have left him with Rosalee at the Spice Shop, she'd happily offered to take him off his hands for a few hours that day but Nick had kindly turned her down.
"You didn't have to bring him here," said the Captain.
"Unfortunately, that wasn't an option, I'm suspended remember, and not for just a week like a thought, but you added another seven days so wherever I go, he goes, at least until his mother gets back from her business trip." Nick said stiffly.
The Captain grunted under his breath.
Things between the two of them had grown particularly glacial ever since Adalind returned to Portland and showed up heavily pregnant to the Precinct, seeking Nick's protection. It's not as thought things hadn't been tense before. The truth was that neither Nick nor Renard had any reason to trust one another, but over the years, they'd carved up a workable relationship, not only between the detective and his Captain but also between the Grimm and the half-Zauberbiest.
It had made Nick's work over the past seven years quite interesting, the blurring line of authority, the constant shift in power, much to Renard's vexation. The half wesen Royal Prince loathed having power and control usurped from his hands and non-more so than in the last couple of years as Nick grew into his heritage, exerting the authority innate and embracing the Grimm within. Additionally, it's what had ultimately destroyed his relationship with Juliette. They'd reached a point where he simply couldn't pretend to be nothing more than a police detective any longer, content only with catching criminals when so much more lay beneath the surface, be it injustice or evil the Kehrseite justice was ill equipped to deal with thoroughly.
Nick could not freely turn a blind eye to the truth, despising his higher calling, all in the name of giving Juliette what she wanted; normalcy. He wanted to, to want what she wanted but it was impossible, his spirit within had grown restless with each passing day as he sensed the turmoil around but had been rendered powerless to confront it, until it came knocking on his best friends' door in the form of the Wesenrein. Much to his relief, Nick had gotten his abilities back but at a great cost, Juliette's humanity, the only thing he regretted.
At first, Nick was certain the Captain was happy to have the Grimm back. After all, the Hundjager almost killed him before he tried to get the potion that would have reversed the effects of the spell robbing Nick of his "gift". Unfortunately, it soon became apparent to Nick, as with all of their dealings between them in the past, that Renard's self-serving trait dominated everything about the man.
Nick had finally accepted that Renards only cared as far as the situation allowed him to have an advantage. Yes, he'd wanted the Grimm back but only for him to exert his control over Nick. It harkened back to Nick's first year when he first got his sight, when he, ironically, had been blinded by the Captain's behind-the-scenes manipulations as he used Adalind against Nick.
Could that be it, could Adalind be the reason things between him and Renard had grown relentlessly cold in the past year, the longest time since Nick had transferred to Portland Central Precinct?
Nick remembered how Renard had tried to wash his hands off Adalind, absolving himself of all culpability for everything that had went down between them the day she revealed to them her pregnancy with his son. Nick couldn't help but wonder if his Captain was having second thoughts. Adalind had done something neither of them saw coming, she'd changed her life and perhaps that had affected both men in ways neither could have foreseen. Nick had fallen in love with the mother of his son and as for Renard; Nick didn't know what he was other than visibly perturbed Adalind had summarily extricated herself from his grasp and control.
Could it be jealousy?
Renard had not only lost his patsy, but he'd finally lost the one person who'd been exceptionally loyal to him, to the point of nearly destroying Nick's world. Looking back, Nick had rued his complicity in falling for Renard's nonsense from the start. Adalind had it correct that day when all three of them stood in that very office, a very round pregnant belly between her and Nick. She wasn't the only one responsible for the mess that had been their lives. Renard had orchestrated Adalind's attacks on the people in Nick's life, from his Aunt Marie, to Hank but Nick had also played his part, in a domino effect sequence of events that had finally resulted in Juliette's life destroyed beyond repair, his own mother dead and Diana missing.
"Well, you broke a man's nose and cracked several of his ribs."
"After finding out about Robin Jaeger and what he and his friends had been up to for years, I say he got off lightly. Just because he wasn't our perp in this particular case doesn't mean he wasn't guilty of goodness knows how many murders or missing person's cases that remain unsolved today because people didn't do their job."
Renard took that a slight against his honour as a police officer.
"Careful there Nick, you forget who you're talking to." Renard bristled with restrained fury.
"Oh I know exactly who I am talking to," said Nick, implying the Captain had forgotten to whom he was talking.
"This department could be sued because of your recklessness."
"You know we won't. He's a killer whose time on the outside is numbered."
"You think because you're Grimm—"
"Look, why did you call me in. I'm not interested in going over this again with you." Nick cut him short, which only inflamed his Captain even more, his attempt to exert power through his position flagging as he sat imposingly behind his large desk while Nick had remained on his feet. To any passer-by, it was easy to assume which of the two men was actually in control.
"Here…" the Captain pulled Nick's gun and badge and tossed them across his desk towards Nick.
"What's this?"
"What does it look like? It wasn't my decision. If I had it my way, your fortnight would have turned into three months, without pay."
Nick grinned inwardly, so that's how it felt to have all of the strings cut, he thought to himself.
"Good thing you're not in charge." Nick said unaffectedly, he was past the point of caring for Renard's feelings. His respect for the job didn't need to extend to his duplicitous and literal two-faced police Captain. Over the years, Nick had often towed the line, falling short of antagonising his Captain who had enough incriminating evidence on Nick, the Grimm to have him arrested and tried for murder but Renard, knowing that Nick too could do the same to him always gave him pause. For so long he'd deceived himself into thinking he and the Captain were on the same side when they weren't. Freedom, Nick felt, had never tasted sweeter.
"We have a situation on our hands and my higher ups want it resolved ASAP, before the media and eventually all of Portland gets wind of this and panic sets in. It's hard enough keeping details of this case from leaking out of the Precinct as its profile has now caught the attention of my superiors. They'd appreciate the closing of this case long before the Feds come busting through our doors and pissing all over everything we've done to try and catch this guy."
"I agree." Nick couldn't argue to that fact. At least they were on the same side about one thing.
There'd been three murders all eerily similar, decapitation and most if not all identifiable marks removed. None of the victims had anything in common except the manner in which they were mutilated, killed, and even then, the details varied from one victim to the next, to make Nick's job difficult but not impossible.
"I take it Griffin's been sharing with you and you are up to speed with everything?"
"Yeah, I know that the latest victim is female, she was found 2 days ago in an alleyway, behind the drugs store on Gordon's. There's surveillance across the two adjoining streets but nothing we can use. It's as if the killer knows where not to walk. She was naked covered with bloody newspapers and trash. She was an addict judging by the needle marks found on her arms, behind her knees and both of her big toes."
"What are you thinking?" Renard asked.
"I don't know what to think, besides the decapitations there's nothing else about their murders that links these three people together, except maybe the scenes of the crimes. All three were found in some kind of shop. Maybe that is the connection, the pet hotel, the antique shop and now drug store. Maybe the killer has something against all three, a past injustice or—"
"Or maybe our killer is a Grimm." Renard dropped a bomb between them.
"You're kidding right?"
"I'm not. Maybe the decapitation is the connection. Isn't that what your kind does, decapitate people?"
What was Renard driving at? Was this his way of sticking it to Nick?
"You said it yourself. The vics have nothing in common, except how they died.
"…Except Jennifer O'Dair was all human from Boston. We know what Jaeger was; this latest victim was probably a homeless, opioid addict who found herself at the wrong place at the wrong time. It doesn't track. I'll give you Sweet Robin but not the other two."
"Who are you trying to convince with that? If I didn't know better, I'd say you did it. It's happened before, attacking innocent people until only one was left standing. Maybe Adalind leaving you caused you to snap and now have decided to follow after your ancestors' ways."
"That's bullshit and you know it!" He barked at the Captain, which violently roused Kelly from his semi-sleep and he began to cry.
"I never thought I'd see it…Adalind. She has you wrapped around her little finger, or is it her soft thighs, that you've lost yourself. Forgotten the man you are. Don't think I haven't noticed your more violent streak rearing itself ever since she dumped you. Terry Wagner's broken nose and cracked ribs weren't the first victim of Nicholas Burkhardt, the Grimm."
"You asshole, leave her out of this!" Nick fumed as he stepped closer until the large desk blocked his path and he towered over Sean Renard.
The Captain smirked from his chair. "Don't you worry Nick; I already know you didn't do it. I just wanted to see something. Who would have thought, a Grimm with a Hexenbiest? I thought you were at least smarter than that, falling for that—"
"Be careful of what you say next if you really want to see me forget myself. It's for the respect of my son you're not flat on your back with more than just a broken nose and a few cracked ribs."
"…As if you'd dare…."
"Try me and find out."
He didn't.
Nick grabbed his badge and gun and walked out of Renard's office without so much as a backward glance, recognizing that the day he and Renard would finally settle things between them once and for all, had long past due. When two opposing forces come together, it made sense one would have to give way to the other, stronger force, and Nick could hardly wait to wipe the smug off the half wesen Royal Prince of Portland!
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His temper hadn't subsided one bit as he pulled up into his garage after his meeting with his Captain, his own fault for letting Renard get under his skin the way he had. It led Nick to changing his mind with Kelly and take Rosalee up on her offer to watch him for a few hours so he could blow off some steam at the shooting range. It was either that, or deck someone with his fists but that had gotten him into too much trouble as it was already, so he went shooting instead.
Emptying several clips on an immovable target only relieved him of some of the tension built up from earlier and not all. Nick cursed himself, since when did her let his emotions get the better of him? Since it was Renard, the hideous thought thundered against his frontal lobe.
His whole life, Nick had learnt to compartmentalise, from his job, his Grimm life, his emotions, a by-product of losing his parents at an early age and trekking through half of the country with his Aunt Marie as she raised him up. Because they never stayed in one town too long for him to form any meaningful relationships, Nick had grown accustomed to bottling up everything, "a defence mechanism," said one child psychologist.
If he never put himself out there, there'd be zero probability for getting hurt. This philosophy had worked marvellously until his move to Portland when they stationed him at the PCP and he met Juliette. He thought he'd gone against the grain when he let himself feel for another person. Juliette was not his first love, but she was his longest love, the one he thought would last a lifetime. She was the one he let himself believe was the one so he went and bought her a ring. He loved her and that had been the most logical thing to do, the "next step" in their relationship, somewhat, a calculated move not driven entirely by a deep wealth of emotions.
When he'd asked Juliette to marry him and she had turned him down, he hadn't lose it. They'd work things out, he told himself, a reasonable expectation in an unconventional situation. When he lost his aunt and all sorts of crazy bust through his house almost weekly because he was a Grimm, he grieved but stoically doubled down on his duties and dealt the chaos in his life without missing a beat. Everything that life threw at him, Nick always managed to get on top of every circumstance with a tenacious grip over his emotions, no matter how heated things got. Only with his mother's death did he give in to the fullness of his rage.
Before that day, Nick never saw himself as someone with sensitive buttons for others to push until Renard said Adalind's name, specifically how he said her name, noticeably too familiar. Nick's gut coiled in anger with each syllable the Captain had spoken, had it not been for Kelly, Nick was as sure as the sky was blue, he would have ripped the Captain's head from his neck.
The night Juliette disappeared, the night she could have killed him, she'd told Nick everything she'd done during her twisted bend for vengeance, wanting to inflict as much pain on him as she could when it dawned on her that killing him would not ease her pain. She knew how to cut him, destroying what little trust he had in her, and ultimately the love that he'd felt for her but he believed not a single word of it. He didn't want to.
Moreover, the Captain had carried himself as normal, nothing short of Nick's ally. He never once alluded to anything having happened between him and Juliette so Nick had foolishly brushed the betrayal aside, chucking it as nothing more that the ramblings of an embittered, angry Juliette, until today, he thought. Juliette had made a fool of him with his boss and that bastard tried to come at him through Adalind, knowing exactly how Nick would react.
He felt his blood begin to boil at the memory from that morning's meeting but reined it in as he entered his darkened loft with his son tucked safely in his arms. Although Nick recognised his Captain's wounded animal-like attack for what it was, desperate, unfortunately, the sting still made its mark. He wanted to kick himself for showing his emotions so carelessly in front of his enemy, because that is what Renard was truly, underneath all of his moral platitudes because he wore the same badge as Nick.
"Shit." He growled between his teeth as his foot caught on something heavy on the floor, almost causing him to stumble before he flicked the switch for some light. He apologised to his son for the profanity while seeking the immediate source of his frustration. It was a piece of black luggage that he couldn't remember leaving in that spot that morning. Then an excited calm swept over him as he saw a pair of navy pumps peaking behind the leather case and he rushed up to his bedroom door and saw a dark but familiar silhouette lay across his bed. He froze, as if he couldn't believe his eyes but then again he did have great eyesight, in fact, better than great.
"Adalind…." He said her name softly, almost reverentially and it was enough to rouse her from her sleep.
"Nick," she called out his name, as if coming out of a thick fog into the glorious light of day. Sheepishly, he smiled to himself thinking his name had never sounded as melodic as it did from her lips.
Adalind bolted from the bed and flung her arms around both him and Kelly, and caused his whole body to quiver with intoxicating joy. Hardly a year since Kelly's birth and he still couldn't believe the effect this woman had on him…a certain power over him and expectedly he'd fought it because it was the sensible thing to do. This was Adalind Schade after all.
In the beginning, he had first denied it to Hank, the day they first locked eyes on each other from across the street. He'd denied it to himself, the day they sat face to face in a hotel room while a Queen Mellifer hunted her down. He'd denied it to Adalind herself when she smiled at him seductively with the jail bars fixed firmly between them. He even denied it to Juliette at the Precinct on the day she'd accused him of harbouring illicit feelings for the blonde Hexenbiest but now as he inched ever closer towards bedside, towards her, Nick realised then that all of those times he had lied to everyone, himself included. Of late, not only did Nick stop fighting, he willingly gave himself up to this fact, and it felt right, freeing.
He held on tightly, making a squishy sandwich of Kelly who was unimpressed with his father's ardent hold, as if he were afraid to let them go. A mistake he intended never to repeat ever again.
Nick drank her in, inhaling deeply her sweet scent, wanting it to fill his senses to overflowing. Before that moment, he could never quantify the true depth of the longing he'd felt in the months passed without her.
"Hey," he said finally.
"Hi," she sighed with what sounded like relief but immediately stepped out of his embrace as though she'd been caught doing something she shouldn't, much to Nick disappointment. Instinctively, he released Kelly for mother and son to have this time to themselves after what he sensed was a harrowing period of separation for Adalind.
He swallowed the surging ache in his arms that extended all the way to his heart as she stepped even further away from him, was that the first time he'd held her in his arms in months? The thought cut him in ways he hadn't expected. Adalind leaving him exposed a gash within that hadn't closed, rather it grew deep, and wide for every day he spent apart from her. He'd spent months alone, morose, all for what…pride…prejudice. Resentment for old wounds inflicted in a different time? It wasn't as though he himself had been innocent.
Now he felt overwhelmed with uncertainty, not sure how to proceed as he watched the unfolding scene, like an outsider intruding on something private. They were his family and he certainly belonged to be in those scenes, relieved they were finally together again.
He wanted to kick himself for, as Monroe was now so quick to point out, his reticence; a far cry from the man only a few weeks ago who was ready to open up and allow himself to live the life he wanted with the woman he knew he loved. Nothing had changed other than how intensely he felt.
Unable to hold back any longer, Nick strode to sit by her side, noting the little gasp that escaped her lips.
Adalind clung a bit more tightly to their son, her heart racing to the same beat as his. His hands balled nervously into fists. It was either that, or shoving them deep into his pockets lest they wander of their own accord drawn to her cascading locks like a siren's call. In truth, he couldn't just sit there, say and do nothing but wait for her to make the first move as she sometimes did when they still lived together.
Having no hand to hold, Nick laid his one hand on her knee, no higher despite the throbbing temptation.
The fact that she didn't shake it off thrilled him but his voice remained as controlled as ever when his first words to her were, "You should have told me you were coming back today. I would have fetched you from the airport."
No, he wouldn't have. They both knew it but it was not for lack of wanting on his part. It didn't hurt saying it because he wanted it to be true regardless.
"It wasn't necessary…but I would have liked that." She shifted Kelly's weight in her arms and laid her newly free hand over his and Nick curled his fingers around it.
He had a million questions, questions he couldn't come out and ask in the handful of video calls he'd made during the time she was away, like what happened with Felix (he knew because of Monroe but wanted to hear it from her lips as if to reassure him she was alright…safe). He also wanted to know why she hadn't come home as soon as the Bonaparte deal fell through.
"Nick…about the books, I've good some good news and some bad news." She said sombrely.
"Don't worry about tha—"
"Bonaparte didn't get the book but I don't know who did."
"I know—"
"By the time we met Monroe's uncle, he'd already sold the book, a couple to be exact—wait, what do you mean you know? How?" she raised her brow at him questioningly, almost demandingly. He smiled to himself, finding that little quirk adorable suddenly.
"It's a long story actually," he said sheepishly, now embarrassed he'd gone behind her back after she'd entrusted all of that money into his hands.
"Monroe, of course, he must have spoken to his uncle about what happened in Germany."
"Not exactly," He said and got up from the bed and walked to the far end of the bedroom, just behind the stairs that lead up to the roof and dragged a large wooden chest into view. "They are all here, I mean the books. We got them all, thanks to you." He said proudly. "
"I don't understand." She said confused.
"I mean, our son is safe, no one will ever hurt him, not with you or both of us to make certain of it."
"Oh Nick…" She made her way to where he stood.
He watched as sweet relief washed over her face. It worked something deep inside his chest to see her reaction. These were Grimm books, which brimmed with tales of his ancestors and their often-deadly exploits against wesen-kind and probably against some of which were her ancestors, he thought. In spite of that, Nick couldn't mistake the pure joy on her face as she looked down at the treasure trove.
"I'm sorry I couldn't say anything before. I really wanted to believe me but we didn't know who could be listening, if anyone at all and I knew you wouldn't want me to chance it." He desperately wanted to hug her.
As if she read his mind, Adalind, awkwardly wrapped one of her arms around him, leaning gently against his broad chest. It amazed him how she fit him so perfectly, not just in a physical sense but something deeper than that. He felt at ease being in Adalind's arms. All the tension he felt from early that day, week, the last three months melted away in that simple embrace. As cliché as it sounded, Nick was finally at home in the arms of the blonde Hexenbiest. His whole life, he'd never known the encompassing peace he felt in that very moment, but also the all-consuming fear brought on by being away from her.
"I cannot imagine how worried you must have been all that time, I am sorry."
"It doesn't matter now." She muffled against his jacket. He missed this all too much, having her so near.
How long they held on to one another, he couldn't tell. It was all too much for him, not even with Juliette did he ever feel such dizzying highs, which, ironically, equalled his deepest lows. There was no any middle ground where Adalind was concerned. She always could extract from him the most candid and extremely intense reaction without even trying.
"You've no idea how much I missed you." This time he would not let her go. "Honestly, I was probably just as worried about you. Rosalee had to talk me down a number of times to keep me from flying all the way to Germany and bring you home."
"She did?" His confession lightened up her face. "You could have fooled me." She added, alluding to their few calls continents apart. Nick had intentionally kept their calls light, focusing on their son and whatever new adorable things he'd done that day.
"I have a mean poker face. There's a lot about me you don't know and I want you to…to know me that is. To know what's on my mind…and what's in my heart. It's you. That day at the restaurant and later that night, there was so much I wanted to say, like how sorry I am for being such an idiot, a senseless idiot who couldn't get over himself long enough to see what was in front of him all along."
"Nick…"
"No. I need to get this off my chest; I have waited too long as it is. Remember that day you'd been arrested and I came to see you?"
"How could I forget, I was terrible!" she said glumly as she broke free from his arms and turned from him. Nick watched as she placed Kelly down in his crib. "Sheesh, what have you been feeding him? He weighs a tone," she stretching her arms.
Adalind took a weary seat at the foot of the bed. The woman was completely alluring, no matter what she did or even how she looked. Nick couldn't stop himself from watching her, mesmerised by her every move. In the past, she shyly hid behind her long lashes whenever she caught him looking her way. He made a silent prayer for her to look up and see how enraptured he was with her but Adalind had closed her eyes from the world, shutting everything out.
He watched her quietly despising how distant she seemed to him, especially when he thought they had made inroads towards something they both wanted before Germany. He wondered if something happened whilst away. A cold sweat trickled down his spine as a thought cross his mind. Worse, did she no longer feel the same for him?
Nick took his place beside on her the bed, "Adalind, do you remember what you said to me that day in jail?"
"I said a lot of things, many of which were horrible."
"Not those things. You said something that I thought I had forgotten over the years but I did not. You said we could be fun together and you were right."
"Actually, I said, '…under different circumstances, I think you and I could have really had some fun,' and you called me a witch and you were correct in that assessment."
This conversation was not going the way Nick had hoped. He wasn't bringing up the past to make her feel horrible about herself, but he wanted to draw something positive from their shared experience. Try harder, he thought bluntly.
"No, you saw something that I couldn't see at the time, the truth between us. Maybe it's been there since the beginning, that day in the sunshine where we saw each other for the first time and I mean really saw each other. With everything that's happened, maybe fate had a lot to do with all of it."
"Nick, what are you talking about, you're not making any sense and fate, really? I didn't peg you as one of those," she said dryly.
"Just…humour me for a second. I have had a lot of time to think about us and maybe fate is a bit of a stretch but then again who knows. You and I have had this song and dance going between us from the very start. Yes, it wasn't pretty but it wasn't all ugly either."
"Clearly we remember things differently," she quipped.
"The first day we laid eyes on each other, I was with Hank and I remember a beautiful, sexy lawyer caught my attention."
She actually snickered at his description.
"Oh you don't believe me, do you? Ask Hank, he'll tell you. And I do not doubt in my mind that you thought the same about me." He said, puffing his chest for extra emphasis, which actually made her laugh out loud.
Yes, finally.
"Yeah…beautiful and sexy, that's you, Nicholas Burkhardt!"
"What can I say, we made an impression. Anyway, remember the Mellifer."
"It's hard to forget the person trying to kill you."
"What else?"
"Nick, what's with the twenty questions? I am a Hexenbiest and you're a Grimm and the truth is right there in those books about our kind. We've lived it, every horrible we could ever do to each other."
"Well, not everything. I recall you pushing my buttons and I had goaded you to woge and—"
"You smiled at me…." She said.
"I did and in that moment, neither of us was afraid of the other or wanted to kill the other."
"Are you sure about that?" she said with a knowing gleam in her eyes.
"You had your shot and you didn't take it."
"Not with Hank in the other room."
"That's a weak excuse and you know it. You said it yourself, you're a Hexenbiest and I am a Grimm but none of that registered, something else was at play. I got into trouble once when I was young, before I lost my parents. The school Principal had called my mom. You see, I had pulled this girl's pigtails in the playground; Sally Granger and she turned around and punched me in the face, giving me a black eye for a week."
"What?" her continued laughter filled the air around him, a beautiful sound to his very keen ears.
"That night, instead of scolding me, my mom told my dad, who then sat me down and gave me the worst punishment you could give a ten year old, a speech about the birds and the bees. Sally Granger was my first girlfriend."
Adalind cackled and after about a minute, she stopped and gave Nick a suspicious and quizzical look. "Wait, what does ten year-old you have anything to do with us in that hotel room? You're not saying—"
"That unbeknownst to either of us, I had proverbially pulled your pigtails that day."
"That's a stretch."
She didn't believe him.
"That's the thing; I don't believe it is a stretch.
"Next, you're going to tell me you didn't love Juliette the whole time we battled it out all over Portland?" she said sarcastically.
"Of course not, that would be a lie and you'd see right through it.
I have played that day a million times in my mind, plus a million others after that, like when I shot the Queen Mellifer."
"You were doing your job."
"I didn't tell Juliette about you, at least not yet."
"You were protecting her."
"That night in the Bremen Ruins, I kissed you."
"That wasn't a kiss." She said, catching his off-guard.
For years, he'd kept that little secret to himself, unable to make heads or tails of his choice of action in saving Hank's life. He'd chalked it up to adrenaline, a heat of the moment kind of thing, where he hadn't given too much thought to it. Rosalee had given him a tiny syringe he had to wait until the final moments to draw fresh blood before plunging it into Adalind. If that couldn't work, he had a pocket knife he could have used to tear the flesh of his skin and let just let his blood coming in contact with Adalind's during their very bloody fight, but no, Nick kissed the woman he'd claimed to hate with every fibre of his being.
He never told his friends how he'd broken the spell, let alone Juliette that he'd kissed another woman that wasn't his girlfriend. Adalind may not have realised it then but that night had changed so much between them, at the very least how viewed her. He could still remember how her hurt and vulnerable state tugged at his heart when she declared tearfully how he'd killed her. Unsuccessfully, Nick had tried to harden his heart against the clash of emotions welling up inside him; this was Adalind Schade the women who had tried to destroy him through the people closest to him, he'd thought. He wasn't supposed to feel anything for her but contempt and loathing, yet he did. Strangely, Nick had forgotten they were age-old enemies, before that night, he could not remember a time when he'd caused as much pain to someone as he did to Adalind and to his shame, it would be his last.
He looked at the crib where their son slept,
"It still happened and two years later, he we all are." He said.
"I am sorry about that," she said.
"I know you are and I am sorry too. The truth is that we both made mistakes but they have led us to this moment, like what I did to you with Diana. I will never forgive myself for that. I know what it was like when I lost my parents and I know how hard it was for my mom living all those years knowing she could not be with me and I'm ashamed for my part in taking Diana away from you."
"You know I don't blame you for that."
"Well, I do."
"Honestly, it's not like I had a ringing endorsement that I would do good with Diana. My life was so chaotic back then, I had made enemies everywhere I went, there was no way I could offer Diana a good life, not with the Royals chasing us down."
"It doesn't change the fact that I was wrong and you've lost your daughter, maybe forever, because of me."
Adalind twitched at the word, forever, which served to deepen Nick's regret.
"I'm also sorry for letting you bear the brunt of our past here in this place, to the point that you were afraid of me, afraid of being yourself with me. It wasn't fair of me. I should have shown you more understanding so when your powers returned we'd deal with it together but instead I made you feel like you were the bad guy, the villain in our story, when I also played the part in your story."
"So what are you trying to say?"
"Something I should have told you ages ago but I was too slow to catch on what my heart already knew. We are two halves of a whole, you and me. You've been a part of every significant thing to happen in my life apart from my parents, good and bad. I cannot look forward and see my life without you in it and I don't want to try because I love you Adalind Schade. I just hope that I'm not too late."
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