Author's Note: Hello, everyone! I hope you are all keeping safe out there in these turbulent times. Keep healthy and strong. Take care and thank you for taking the time to read my story! Let me know what you think! Enjoy!

Hayley swallows, rubbing the ends of her fingers together. "Hi, Caroline. I'm surprised to run into you here, so far away from Mystic Falls."

"Yeah," Caroline says, flatly, running a hand through her hair. "You too."

They lapse into silence, both girls just sitting there, staring at the rack of alcohol behind the bar without talking. The last distinguishing memory that Caroline has of Hayley was of the girl breaking her neck and leaving her in a bathroom for April Young to find. Caroline was mad, and maybe a week ago she still would have been mad to see Hayley here, but now it feels like all of that is all beneath her at this point. The last thing she cares about is what Hayley Marshall was thinking that day, and why she did what she did.

Perhaps Caroline would have been a bit more tactful in approaching this situation, but all Caroline can think about is the fact that Hayley knows. Out of everyone in the city, Hayley knows.

"What are you doing here, Hayley?" Caroline asks, turning to look at the older woman next to her.

Hayley looks around for a moment before letting out a sigh and turning to look over at Caroline, chewing on her bottom lip for a moment before finally saying, "I am here in search of my family. I've tracked them down here, to New Orleans, but now I'm having trouble locating them."

"Did you just get into town?" Caroline asks, pushing her empty water glass away.

"This morning," Hayley says, fluffing her own hair. As soon as the two of them realized that they were both touching their hair, they both drop their hands onto the bar top, pressing their lips together as they stare at one another. Hayley looks just as uncomfortable as Caroline feels. "Okay," Hayley says like she feels like she has to fill the silence, "so what about you? What are you doing here?"

Caroline lets out a long-winded sigh. "It's complicated. The witches here are being oppressed by a vampire by the name of Marcel Gerard," she says softly, "so they wanted help in taking care of him, I guess, so they used me to bring him here."

Hayley's eyebrows pull together. "So... is this Marcel the reason that the wolves aren't anywhere in sight? I mean, do you think?"

Caroline raises her eyebrows, not having considered that before. She didn't know that werewolves were even in this city. She hadn't heard of any of them since she got here, so she can only assume, either they aren't here anymore, or they are so deep underground that she hasn't heard of them yet. But then again, she is aware that she hasn't been in the best place these last few days. Klaus and Elijah might know better than her, though.

"I don't know," Caroline says honestly, "but I don't see why he wouldn't be the reason for it. I didn't know that there was supposed to be werewolves here, but I haven't really been in the best of ways recently, so I'm not the person to be asking this." Caroline rubs at her shoulder a bit. "But if they are here, you're going to be sticking around for a while, aren't you?"

Hayley's eyebrows pull together and rise a bit. "I mean, yeah. Why wouldn't I? If my family is here, I would want to be with them."

Yeah, that's what Caroline thought. Which means now they have a new problem that Caroline's sure they are going to have to handle promptly before it gets out of hand. She's just got to think of a way to do that.

Hayley blinks a few times, considering, before asking, "Wait, did you say they used you to bring him here? Who's 'him'?"

"That would be me."

Caroline and Hayley both jump, Caroline nearly falling out of her chair if a hand on her back hadn't prevented her from doing that. She turns to look over her shoulder at Klaus standing just out of their peripherals. Caroline lets out a groan, rubbing at her forehead and with both her hands slide them through her hair as she lets out a whoosh of breath.

"Jeez, Klaus, you scared the life out of me," Caroline snaps, glaring at him, placing her hands over her chest as she turns around in her seat to lean against the bar so that she can face him.

Hayley sits completely frozen, her pretty green eyes pressed closed as if somehow he would just go away if she didn't acknowledge him. But surely she must feel his blue eyes burrowing into the side of her face. No doubt she's thinking about the role she played in Klaus losing all of his hybrids. She sucks in a deep breath before turning around to face him, no doubt realizing that he wasn't going to go away even if she pretended that he would. Her lips were pressed together tightly as she raises her eyes to his.

She's afraid, Caroline can see it. No doubt Bonnie got her message and notified Klaus. Or at least Stefan. But either way, someone had to of told Klaus or he wouldn't have known to come running.

"Hello, Klaus."

"You have an awful lot of nerve showing your face in front of me after what you did," Klaus growls, tilting his head down so that he was staring at her through long lashes. It's a dark look that Caroline knows means he's ready to start tearing the world apart. Starting with the person usually standing right in front of him.

"Trust me," Hayley says slowly, "if I had a choice, I definitely would never be standing before you again, but my leads led me here. My family is here. I know it."

Klaus narrows his eyes more, looking unimpressed. Caroline reaches out to touch Klaus's arm, hoping that would somehow satiate his anger a bit, which it seems like it does as his tense muscles relax a bit beneath her fingers.

"Klaus..." Caroline says softly.

"Fine," Klaus growls, "for Caroline, I won't kill you. Just stay out of our way, or I will quickly change my mind."

Hayley opens her mouth, looking like she's ready to agree when Caroline cuts in, "No, Klaus. She has to come with us. We need to talk to her. Away from here." They both look at her like she's crazy. She lowers her voice and whispers, "Sophie Deveraux is here. We have to get out of this shop before she starts to sense something is up."

She wraps the hand that is already on Klaus's arm, around it and uses it to help her balance as she steps off the stool and over her's and Bonnie's bags. She bends down, grabbing a handful and passing them over to him, which it took him a second to realize as she pried his hand open to drape the handles across his palms, before grabbing the rest.

"Come," Caroline says, then pauses, blinking rapidly. She doesn't remember if she paid for her food or not. So she wiggles around until she can grab out her wallet, dropping thirty bucks down on the table, hoping that it was enough to pay for the gumbo and give Cami a good tip, before leading them out. Or, leading Klaus out. When Hayley didn't immediately follow, Caroline turned to her and snaps, catching Sophie staring out at them from the kitchen curiously, "If you want to apologize for what you did to me, then come with us now, Hayley."

Caroline stares at the brunette until she sighs, standing up and follow after them.


Caroline sets down the bags just inside the front door as Klaus and Hayley walk in. Caroline brought Klaus and Hayley to Stefan's car, to which Klaus made the cheeky comment while he was climbing into the driver's seat, that "Stefan would have wanted it this way," much to her chagrin. It annoyed her but then she realized that she just didn't know the way back to the house anyway, and rather than live through the immediate embarrassment of having to ask Klaus for the address again to plug it into the GPS and then maneuver the streets to find the best way back, she'll let Klaus have the win.

She's magnanimous that way.

But once they made it back home, Klaus's car was already there, and now so was another. Fancy, so it no doubt belonged to Elijah, which makes sense, seeing as he was somewhere else in the world before he was in New Orleans. He didn't fly like a bat there. Caroline's guess would be that he drove. She could be wrong, but she's not sure that she is.

"Alright, we brought the traitor into our home, Caroline," Klaus snaps, dropping the cans on the ground without even the slightest care for the fact that they were actually paints and no something more malleable..

"Hey! Don't break those!" Caroline snaps back, glaring at him.

"What is going on, Caroline?" Klaus demands, turning dark blue eyes toward her. He crosses his arms over his chest, completely disregarding the paints that he could have broken.

"Care?" Bonnie calls, emerging from one of the side rooms with Stefan and Elijah right behind her. "Oh thank goodness, are you okay?" She walks over to Caroline, looking her up and down before placing a hand on her shoulder.

"Fine," Caroline growls, still glaring at Klaus. She gives Bonnie's hand a squeeze to show her best friend that she appreciated the thought but wasn't ready to back down from her glaring contest with Klaus.

"Who is our unexpected guest?" Elijah asks, giving Hayley a sideways look. Her arms were wrapped around herself, looking obviously uncomfortable and misplaced.

"Hayley Marshall," Caroline says, gesturing half-heartedly at the werewolf. "She's the werewolf that helped Tyler break the sire bond of Klaus's hybrids, which naturally pissed him off - "

Hayley cuts in, shrinking a bit at the look everyone was sending her, "Kinda wished that one could have been left without mention. I'm not sure there is a lot keeping Klaus from going all big bad wolf..." she mumbles, letting out a deep sigh.

Caroline binks a few times while Klaus glares at Hayley now, lips pressing tightly together in anger. Yeah, he probably didn't need Caroline to remind him of why he was mad at Hayley, to begin with. She definitely could have just let that one be. Klaus looks like he's airing on the side of control for the moment, but that's a thin line that he's treading and he looks like he's willing to give up on it soon. She can tell by the way he starts pacing around the foyer, hands folding behind his back while he turns his eyes up toward the ceiling.

"Okay, listen," Caroline says, realizing that she's losing control of this situation fast. "Hayley is here look for her family, right?" She looks over at the werewolf girl, who nods slowly, "And if her family is here, then she's going to be staying in New Orleans for a while."

"I'm not seeing why I should care about any of this? If I kill her now, she's not going to be a problem at all," Klaus says easily, turning on his heel to look at Caroline. He gives her a boyish, tight-lipped smile. She's not sure why he's trying to be cute. She's going to shoot him down anyway.

Caroline shoots him a dirty look. "We aren't going to kill her, Klaus, and by we, I mean you," Caroline says, crossing her arms over her chest. Naturally, Klaus's smile falls to a pouty frown. "Hayley has to be brought in on this if she's going to stay in town."

"Into what?" Hayley asks, stepping closer to Caroline.

"Are we sure that this is a good idea?" Stefan asks. He catches the look Hayley sends him. "Look, no offense, but you did kind of betray us, and use all of us for your own gain. I'm not sure if Klaus's anger isn't completely unjustified."

"Thanks for that," Hayley mumbles.

"Look," Stefan says, placating, walking over to the staircase and resting an elbow up onto it. "I don't think anyone should die, but I'm not sure how wise it is to bring someone into this that has already betrayed us without even batting an eyelash before."

"I agree with Stefan," Bonnie says, casting Hayley a sideways look. "Just let her go, we definitely don't have to hurt her, let alone kill her. Just send her on her way and we can forget about all of this."

"What did you mean by, apologize for what she did to you?" Klaus asks, curiously, throwing Caroline off her track.

"Huh? Oh, back at the bar?" Klaus nods. "She broke my neck back in Mystic Falls," Caroline says, waving her hand around dismissively when that dark look crosses Klaus's face again. "Don't worry about it. It's ancient history at this point. What I'm saying is, that if Hayley is going to be in town, she has to know what's going on or whatever little plan the two of you," she gestures between Klaus and Elijah, "have conjuring up in your evil mastermind skulls, is going to go to waste seeing as she knows I'm a vampire."

Klaus's expression falls completely flat. "So, we just kill her then. Very well, Caroline. I'm convinced."

"Klaus!" Caroline snaps. "That's not what I'm saying at all!"

Bonnie and Stefan both look at each other as Klaus turns his eyes up toward the ceiling once more, clicking his tongue. "Caroline," Klaus says easily, "I'm just going to fix this issue for us."

Caroline flashes between Hayley and Klaus in the nick of time. Thankfully, he's got good enough reflexes to stop before literally blowing her over. He stopped less than an inch from her, staring down into her eyes. So close, that if both of them filled up their lungs completely, their chests would touch. Caroline stares into his eyes.

"Move, Caroline," Klaus growls.

"No, Klaus. I told you, we aren't killing anyone!" Caroline snaps.

Klaus lets out a huff, lips pressed together tightly, with his eyes half-lidded. "You should just let me take care of this problem before it inevitably blows up in our faces."

"No! I told you, Klaus! No!" Caroline snaps again, glaring up at him. He wasn't going to get up into her face and scare her. She knew that he wasn't going to hurt her, let alone kill her. "I am just saying we have to do something to make sure that our problems don't multiply and all you can think to do is kill people? Klaus, you are unbelievable."

"What?" Klaus asks, indignant, genuinely looking confused. "Killing people does lessen my problems."

Caroline rolls her eyes. "You don't honestly believe that. I'm telling you, Klaus, you better not hurt her, or I swear to god..." she really didn't know how to finish that sentence, but she was going to let him use his imagination so that she didn't have to.

"Caroline, she's a liability," Klaus grounds out, casting a glare over her shoulder at Hayley.

"Klaus, she's a person. An innocent person who is trying to figure out her own problems and the only reason that she's here right now is that she knows that I'm a vampire. Now if it doesn't matter if someone so happened to ask her, and she tells the truth and we don't care one way or the other than she just goes now. But if we do care, we have to make sure that she doesn't say anything to anyone."

"Killing her sounds like the easiest way to do that," Klaus says flippantly, which grates on her last nerves.

"Oh my god, Klaus! We aren't going to kill anyone," Caroline snaps. "I'm going to kick you out of this house if you say that again! I'm asking you to be a decent person and after I've already said no, you keep on insisting on the same terrible thing! God, you are so infuriating!" Caroline was so fired up, yelling at Klaus that she hadn't realized that she was starting to fall over until Klaus grabbed hold of her to keep her steady.

"Caroline!" Bonnie gasps.

"Hey," Stefan calls, touching her shoulder as Klaus steadies her. "Are you okay? Come sit down."

Caroline shakes her head, pushing Klaus's hands away, still mad at him. "No, I'm fine. I'm just not back up to full strength from the car ride down here. I'm just done arguing. What are we going to do?"

"We should all go sit down," Elijah says, walking past Klaus to hold out a hand to Hayley. "Come, Ms. Marshall. We have much to discuss."

Hayley looks like she would rather have her eyes gouged out, but takes his hand slowly and follows him into the sitting room. Stefan helps Caroline after them and she slumps down in one of the approved couches that she and Bonnie let stay in the house. Bonnie sits down next to her as she lowers next to Hayley, offering her a small, sideways glance.

"Alright," Elijah says, sitting down on the other couch, unbuttoning his jacket while Stefan sits down next to him. Klaus, on the other hand, is standing at the head of the coffee table between the two couches. His arms crossed over his chest as he stares at Caroline, who is looking at everything and everyone other than him. "So, tell us about your plans."

Hayley looks around the room, no doubt feeling like she's trapped between a rock and a hard place before basically telling them the same thing she told Caroline at Rousseau's. Which Caroline already told them. Caroline just sinks into the couch, hungry and tired. The gumbo at Roussseaus was really good, but she was so freaked out over what was going on and running into Sophie that she didn't really get to enjoy her meal and get seconds. She hasn't really caught up on the food that she's missed, and she's been skipping meals because of stress and distraction.

Thankfully everyone has been so busy, no one has noticed, but Caroline knows that she's going to have to take better care of herself. Of all the things they did today, Caroline and Bonnie didn't get to go shopping. There is no food in the house. They are going to have to get on that as soon as possible.

"Alright, so this is easy," Stefan says, shrugging his shoulders. "You don't tell anyone about Caroline, in any form, and we leave you alone."

"How can we trust that?" Bonnie asks, eyebrows pulling together. Then, like she actually heard herself say those words, looking past Caroline to Hayley. "No offense."

Hayley looks down at her hands like they are the most interesting thing in the room. "None taken, I guess."

"I suppose we should start with the obvious," Caroline says, rubbing at her forehead. "What do we know about werewolves here in New Orleans?"

"There used to be werewolves here," Elijah says, leaning back into his seat like a king, crossing one leg over the other and rubbing at his chin in thought. "But now that you mention it, I haven't seen any werewolves in the Quarter since we got here." He blinks a few times, casting a look over at Klaus. "Have you heard anything?"

"The clan that used to roam these lands was the Crescents. A strong, noble pack," Klaus muses, walking around the back of the couch, stopping behind Hayley, who tenses up in worry, shoulders pulling in a bit as she feels Klaus's eyes on her. "Show me your back."

"That's a weird thing to ask," Bonnie says, giving Klaus a weird look.

Elijah raises his eyebrows. "Ah, if she's from a clan like that, then there is usually a birthmark if I recall."

"The crescents have a birthmark on their shoulder," Klaus says.

"They do..?" Hayley asks slowly, removing her cover to reveal a simple red tank top and sure enough, there is a discoloration on her shoulder that looks like a crescent moon birthmark. It's very distinctive. Caroline's blue eyes widen in surprise.

"Well, I guess you must be part of this crescent clan, Hayley, because that is very distinctive," Caroline says as she pulls her cover back up over her shoulders, wrapping her arms around herself.

"I guess so," Hayley says softly, looking a bit enchanted at finally getting a name for her pack. Caroline isn't a werewolf, she's not sure how all of that works, but in all the movies and stories that she's read or heard of, pack titles mean something. She has no idea about any of that, but surely Hayley must. Or maybe it's just about learning about a piece of herself that she didn't know before. Caroline kind of felt that way when she learned that the women in her family have problems with carrying children.

Guess now she understands why her family is so small.

"Okay," Stefan says, running his hand through his hair, "now that we know she's part of this clan, what do we know about this clan? And probably more recent history and not something from a hundred years ago."

Elijah leans back on the couch, letting out a small whoosh of breath. "Nothing good, I assure you. I've heard that the werewolves were being oppressed here for many years and suddenly, people stopped seeing them. From what I heard, they're all gone now." Elijah rubs at his chin, thoughtfully. "Well, all but one, I suppose."

Hayley rubs her shoulders before turning to look over at Caroline. "Okay, what's going on? Just tell me. Why does it matter that I know you're a vampire or not." She looks uneasy, and Caroline knows that feeling of not walking to be talked about anymore. To hear that the family that she's been looking for might be gone forever must be so hard to hear. Caroline can see Hayley kneading her cover so hard her knuckles turn white. And honestly, she looks like she's going to cry. But there is also a hardness to her expression like she's not ready to give up just yet.

"Well," Klaus says, walking back around to the head of the coffee table with his hands behind his back, "now that we know dear, sweet Hayley has no more reason to stay..."

"But she does," Stefan says, rubbing at his forehead. "The secrets of her family is here. One way or another. Which means she's going to be sticking around for a while. We aren't going to kill her, but I don't think we can trust her either."

"Then, for the time being, she stays here," Bonnie says, shaking her head and sighing. "If we can't trust her to keep her mouth shut then we might as well supervise her."

Hayley sinks back into the couch. "Great."

Caroline sighs, feeling bad for the brunette, understanding that feeling of claustrophobia. She turns toward Hayley, waiting for green eyes to meet her own blue ones before saying, "I'm pregnant."

Hayley blinks a few times in confusion. She just stares at Caroline, her brain trying to make the blond's words make sense to her. "What?"

"I'm a vampire who's pregnant with a miracle baby and the witches here in New Orleans wanted to use me - and the baby - to draw its father here to help them. But for some reason, they think I'm human. And Klaus and Elijah want to use that to our advantage. Which I'm all for, seeing as this might somehow help protect my baby, but if you say something..." Caroline trails off, staring into Hayley's eyes, hoping that she doesn't have to spell it out any more than she already has.

"This is about protecting your baby..." Hayley says softly, nodding slowly. "I... I understand." She stares at Caroline for a moment, then asks, "How did you do it? Get pregnant, I mean. Vampires are dead."

Caroline shakes her head, letting out a little laugh. "Believe me, I think the miracle baby's existence has more to do with the daddy than me."

"Who's the..." Hayley starts, then stops, looking up at the ceiling before turning a level green gaze toward Klaus. "I knew it. I knew I recognized that scent."

"What do you mean?" Caroline asks, eyebrows pulling together.

Hayley laughs, looking mildly amused, turning her eyes back to Caroline. "Werewolves leave their scent on everything they touch. Especially male werewolves, as a way of marking their territory. Whenever the four of us; you, me, Klaus, and Tyler were in the same room, there was an awful lot of that, wasn't there?" She gives Caroline a look. "They were both fighting over you. Marking you like their territory. But that's what men do, let alone men supercharged by the moon with anger issues."

Caroline makes a face at that. "Just by touching things - by touching people - they leave their scent behind?" Hayley nods. "Like lifting their legs and peeing on everything, like an actual dog?"

Hayley cracks a smile at that while Klaus glares at both of them. "Yeah, well, thankfully they've evolved past that, I think."

"Well, that's good, I guess," Caroline mumbles. "So just by touching, they leave their scent on you. For what? Forever?"

Hayley shakes her head. "No, it depends on the touch. A hand on the shoulder for a second will vanish in seconds, but something more meaningful, like holding someone in a hug or something longer will last longer." She gives her a meaningful look but when it's met with confusion, she says, carefully, "Sex with a werewolf leaves his scent on you for a while, so unless you have sex with another werewolf to cover up the first one, then it lingers far longer than most other acts. And by getting pregnant by a werewolf male, you carry his scent as a shroud around yourself and your baby."

Honestly, just by the quick glance around the room, it seems like Hayley was schooling all of them. Klaus was staring down at the coffee table contemplatively like he was storing all this information into the back of his mind for later.

"It's their way of showing other potential suitors that you're already carrying the child of another and to basically stay away," Hayley says, simply. "I knew the scent was familiar, but the baby is already starting to get a scent all it's own as it starts to grow. How far along are you?"

"Almost four months," Caroline responds, fascinated.

Hayley looks down at Caroline's stomach, pursing her lips a bit. "Well, it's starting to grow. I don't know anything about babies or pregnancy, but it seems like all is going well, as far as I can tell. Which, I'll repeat, is very limited."

Caroline looks down at her stomach, touching it, still not feeling anything. She imagines that the natural expansion of her stomach, while she's sitting, is the beginning of her baby growing, but she knows, when she stands up, her stomach falls flat once more. But maybe that's because she's not far enough along yet to start showing.

Hayley watches Caroline lightly touch her stomach for a moment, a soft expression crossing her face. "I know this all must be scary, Caroline, and you don't have any reason to trust me, but I promise, I'm not going to compromise the safety of your baby. I know what it's like to grow up without parents. I'm not going to do that to your baby by revealing this secret."

She shouldn't she knows that she shouldn't, but Caroline believes her. She's really worried that she's going to make the wrong decision when it comes to the life growing inside of her, but she honestly believes her. Hayley seems like her family is the one thing that she would do anything for. And so long as the safety of Caroline's baby has nothing to do with Hayley's family, she thinks that it'll be safe for her to keep the secret. At least, not until something inexplicable changes.

At least, she hopes so.

"Well," Caroline says, climbing to her feet and turning toward Hayley, "looks to me like you'll be staying with us for a while. So come with me, Hayley and pick your room."


They roped Hayley into helping them paint. It was awkward at first, but it at least gave them something to do without really having to speak to one another, while listening to music off of Caroline's phone. And Stefan decided to help out, now that he was home, and Elijah, for a moment, until something called his attention away, a contact in town reaching out to him about what was going on, and then Klaus barged his way into it too. Thankfully the cans that Klaus handled before were alright.

So they started with Bonnie's room, seeing as she actually had a color that she liked and no furniture to deal with, they got started. Stefan and Hayley started taping everything up and removing covers for outlets while Bonnie mixed the paint and Caroline and Klaus started working on the harder to reach areas that called for a bit more precision. Caroline with her neurotic need for it to be perfect and Klaus with his steady hand from years of painting made a good and efficient team.

Thankfully with the five of them, they were able to get Bonnie's room done in a really good amount of time. They were just about done with some final touches when Caroline suggested that they start on the next room, which was going to be Stefan's as he could have actually settled on a color. Klaus and she would finish the rest.

Klaus waited until they were both sitting down under the window painting the small space before saying, softly, "I'm sorry about what I said. I didn't mean to make you mad."

"Are you sorry about what you said, or are you sorry that it made me mad?" Caroline asks, casting him a withering look.

"Honestly?" Klaus asks, staring at her through long lashes.

Why does she feel like she's not going to like this answer? "Preferably, yeah."

"I'm sorry it made you mad, more than anything." And that would be why. But at least he was honest.

"Listen, Klaus," Caroline says, laying the paintbrush down on the plastic covering the carpet to look at him, "the cycle of violence has got to stop. We have so much to talk about, but this is something we should talk about now. We have to be better, Klaus. Better than our own parents. We have to be on the same page. Our baby is more important than anything else."

Klaus lets out a slow breath. "I couldn't agree more. But keep in mind, love, that a thousand years separate us, and I'm... trying." Klaus goes about finishing the last remaining spots on the wall before laying the brush down next to hers.

"That's all I can ask for," Caroline says, letting out a little sigh of her own. "And I know that we are going to fight about a lot of things because I'm neurotic and your psychotic, but this is good." Klaus grins at her words, eyebrows raised. "And we will fight. We will fight about a lot of things, as I said. But talking about it is the best thing that we can do. The best way we can keep our promise is to keep talking to each other."

Klaus tilts his head a bit. "Our promise?"

Caroline holds up her pinkie finger between them. "Our promise is this; no matter what happens we are going to be there for our baby. No matter how long it's been since we last spoke, or what we feel for each other, we will always be there for our baby when it needs us. Whether it's five, twenty-five or three hundred and five. We'll be there. We'll work together. Because before everything else, our baby is more important."

Klaus looks down at her finger before looking back up at her. "Caroline, there isn't a need for this."

"Klaus, promise," Caroline insists, holding her hand up a bit more. "If we get into a huge fight and vow to never be in the same room as one another, let alone the same continent, that if our baby needs us, we'll come together. For our baby, we'll come together. We'll talk. We'll figure it out."

Klaus sighs. "I promise."

"You better give me your damn pinkie, Klaus Mikaelson," Caroline growls which makes Klaus smile. With a shake of his head, he brings up his own hand, locking pinkies with her own.

"No matter what," Klaus says, his voice soft and his eyes dark, "for our child, we will come together. I swear it."

"I swear too," Caroline says, nodding her head. Caroline lifts her eyes to look outside, seeing that it's starting to get dark out.

They are going to have to spend another night in the hotel, but thankfully their furniture should start to show up tomorrow evening. So Caroline and Bonnie - and now Hayley, it seems, so Caroline is going to have to remember to call the furniture store in the morning to order another bed for her - are going to have to get here early so that they can keep painting.

"Okay," Caroline says, pulling her hand away and pushing to her feet, leaning down to pick up the paintbrushes, "let's go help them get as much of this done as we can before tomorrow."

Klaus nods, following after. "Be careful, Caroline, paint isn't good for a baby, either. Be sure to keep the windows open so the room is properly vented."

"Okay," Caroline agrees, honestly not having thought of that, but glad that someone was. "We'll be careful."

By the time Caroline and Klaus clean up the rest of Bonnie's room, pulling up the plastic sheets and tape before they move on to Stefan's room, they already finished tapping up the room and cracked open the paint. Klaus takes the brushes and goes to clean off the brushes while Caroline moves to help her friends. Bonnie, Hayley, and Stefan are talking about the next few days. About how Hayley was on lockdown until they learned more about the werewolves and what happened to them. Basically, Caroline and Bonnie were going to be looking after Hayley and she was just going to have to be okay with that.

She was understandably reluctant, but agreed for now, which is good. But Caroline does feel bad. Hopefully, this won't last for very long.

They got the first wall almost done when Caroline hears the front door to the house open, which isn't a surprise, since they all wanted her either against the wall with the open window or next to the door so that she wasn't just breathing in paint fumes. So she was probably the only one who heard him walking into the house over the sound of music playing through Caroline's phone.

"Elijah's home," Caroline announces about half a second before Elijah calls out, "Niklaus!"

Klaus purses his lips, sighs, and stands up. "He calls, again."

"It sounds urgent," Stefan says as Bonnie grabs Caroline's phone and hands it over to the blond. She turns off the music, as Caroline and the rest of them pile out to see what the older Mikaelson brother is yelling about.

"Niklaus!" Elijah calls again.

"I hear you, Elijah, I'm not deaf," Klaus grumbles, descending the staircase.

"What's going on?" Bonnie asks, a step behind Stefan. Caroline is behind the Bennett witch and the residential werewolf is one step behind her.

"Jane-Anne Deveraux," Elijah says, watching them descend. His jaw is set hard, eyes locked onto his brother.

"What about her?" Klaus asks, voice dark.

"I just watched Marcel drag her into the streets for performing magic, Niklaus." Klaus stops once he reaches the bottom of the stairs, full lips parting. At his look, Elijah says, "She's dead. Marcel killed her."