Hi y'all! I'm so happy that you guys enjoyed the first chapter! In all honesty, I didn't know how you guys would react to the more dominant Caroline in this fic, but I still wanted to write one where she was as confident as she was in her vampire form.
Anyways, I'm still a little new to the whole writing thing, so please don't hesitate to write constructive reviews or let me know what you think of the story. Hope you guys enjoy this chapter too! :D
Caroline woke up when a sliver of sunlight came through the windows of the hotel. She cracked open her eyes and groaned when sun blinded her. Using her hand as a shield, she looked around the room, taking a minute to remember where she was.
She looked at the clock beside the hotel bed and saw that it was 6 in the morning. Why did the sun rise so early in this city? Sometimes she thought she was a vampire from the way she hated the morning light.
Slipping out of bed, she paused when she felt someone shift behind her. Caroline looked down and admired the man still asleep on the other side of the bed.
Klaus' hair was tousled from their activities last night, the curls laying messily on his head. Goodness knows how many times she ran her hands through his locks during their trysts. They had been up all night since the man was apparently as ravenous as she was. They had done it once in front of the door and barely made it to the bed for the second round before they fell asleep.
Then he woke her up during the night for another round, and she had no complaints. The man was the best lay she ever had and apparently very creative with his sexual positions. She could grip at those built arms all night as he continuously thrusted into her, and she did.
He was by far one of the sexiest men she ever laid her eyes on with his distinct dimples and that British accent. Regardless of spending most of her life in Europe, she never attained the refined accent nor heard it sound quite so husky. She bit her lip to stop from moaning when she remembered how it sounded when he groaned out her name.
Looking back at Klaus, she felt bad leaving the slumbering Adonis. She probably would never see him again and he would have no way to look for her without her full name. Not that she would want him to look her up. She refused to have more than a one night stand, and he didn't look like a man to be chained down anyway.
Such a shame, but at least they had an explosive night to remember him by. And now she had to get back to reality. She had a mission to get to and a flat to move into.
She quietly slipped on her dress and shoes, stopping ever so often when she heard Klaus turning in his sleep. She scribbled a note to him on the hotel's notepad and slipped out of the room with her bags in tow.
Taking one last glance at the man, she doubted she would ever find someone with a personality as refreshing and thrilling as his. If this was another life, perhaps they could have had many adventures together. Smiling, Caroline closed the door and headed out into the city.
The alarm blared across the hotel room. Klaus' hand shot out from under the covers to shut off the insistent noise as an annoyed growl was ripped from his throat.
He sat up on the bed and noticed that Care was already gone, along with all her belongings. Funny, usually he was the first one to leave. Guess she really tired him out last night if he didn't even awaken when she left.
A piece of paper left on the bedside table caught his eye and he grabbed for it. In fine cursive it said:
"Klaus,
At first, I thought it might be a bit too cliché to leave a note but then again, you do like traditions right?
Thanks for a fun night, but work calls. I assumed your work started at 8 a.m. since you said you worked for an office last night, so I set up the alarm for 7 a.m. I hope it isn't too early or late. Your clothes are also hanging on the closet door. Please be a dear and check out for me.
Pleasure to have meet your acquaintance,
Care"
He looked towards the closet and saw his pants and shirt were indeed hanging. A smirk made it too his face, the woman never ceased to surprise him. First she seduced him, gave him the best sex he ever had, and now she ran off without even leaving a phone number. Sure, he probably wouldn't have called her but girls usually left a number and none of his one-night stands even cared about wrinkling his clothes.
But sadly, the missing golden haired beauty was right, he had work to get too. His mother would castrate him herself if he showed up late for the princess.
Caroline wheeled her suitcase into the office building and could feel all worker eyes on her. She had worn a long jacket over her dress from the previous night but that didn't stop everyone from wondering what a woman was doing charging up to the service desk like the office was suddenly a hotel.
When she reached the young woman at the desk, she saw her plaster on a hesitant smile. Caroline could see that she was confused about whether or not to point her to the nearest hotel and couldn't even blame her. The office staff had no way of knowing who she was.
Almost everyone here except for those who were of higher power were normal office workers. Her family used the legitimate business downstairs to cover up the less-than-legal business going on on the higher floors of the building. And unlike normal workers, anyone with connections to her family's other profession had their files and pictures locked away and only to be opened by those with enough clearance.
Vicky, as her tag said, greeted her and Caroline smiled back.
"Good morning, Vicky," she said in a professional voice, "I understand your confusion at the moment, but may I please borrow your phone? Mine seems to have run out of battery over night."
The receptionist gave her a quizzical look but saw no harm in letting her borrow the guest phone thinking that she would just call a cab and be on her way. Caroline gave a smile in her direction when the woman nodded her consent.
Picking up the phone from the table, she punched in Esther's extension number and waited as it rang through.
"Hello. Esther Mikaelson speaking," a voice said on the other side.
"Nice to hear your voice again, Mama E."
There was a pause on the other side of the line and a quick, "I'll be down in a moment" before the line went dead.
Caroline placed the phone down and thanked Vicky. No doubt Esther ran out of her office the moment she heard her signature nickname. It had been years since she last called her that.
A wide smile formed on her lips when a woman in a black suit and pencil skirt stepped out of the elevator seconds later.
The woman took one look at her and a smile formed on Esther's lips to match hers.
"Miss Forbes, that must be you. That sweet child could only grow up to be such a beauty like you," Esther greeted walking towards her. She would never forget that glowing smile of hers.
In ten years, she could see that she had grown into a beautiful young woman just like her mother. It was no wonder Liz was so protective of her, she was probably beating off guys with a stick.
Caroline rejected her handshake and instead gave her a hug. "Enough of the 'Miss Forbes.' I'm sure you haven't forgotten about your other daughter in just ten years. Have you, Mama E?" she joked.
"I could never forget my lil' Care-bear," Esther said, "But I don't think the nickname suits a grown woman any more."
"Then I'll just have to settle for 'Care' then," she responded.
"We should get you set up in your room," Esther said leading her toward the executive elevator, ignoring the whispers of the workers who were looking at the scene in confusion. Briefly, she turned around to regard Vicky, "Please have her bags sent upstairs, Miss Donovan."
"Right away, ma'am," Vicky responded. Quickly shaking out of her stupor, she picked up the phone to call someone to grab Miss Forbes' bags.
"How did you get here? I was informed that you were to arrive at 10. I would have had my son to pick you up if I had known you arrived earlier," Esther continued.
The elevator shut behind them before Caroline answered. "It's alright. I just got here this morning and didn't mind taking the cab. I know my mother probably made it sound like I should be protected like I was made of gold but I thought it was lower risk to go incognito." Caroline completely skimmed over the fact that she had technically arrived last night, but sometimes a small white lie was better than explaining where she had been staying and with who.
"Let's hope your mother thinks that."
Both chuckled together knowing that Liz would scold both of them if she ever got a whiff of Caroline's lone arrival.
"It's been so long. How has the family been? And I heard that Niklaus is too be my new guard?" Caroline asked as the elevator climbed higher and higher.
"Everything here has been doing great, well except for the whole Kai uprising. And yes, Niklaus was chosen by your mother to be your personal guard. Even though I'm sure you have no need for it."
"I don't understand why she decided to get me a guard this time. She lets me go on cartels and assassinations but the minute I step into a city, I have to be baby sat like I'm 12."
"Kai is a rather dangerous man and in this crime infested city, she probably thought that you can never be too safe."
"Suppose I should be happy that she only hired Niklaus instead of a whole fleet of guards like Damon and Stefan wanted her to."
The elevator door opened to the top floor of the building and both women stepped out. Caroline searched through her purse and produced a key.
Unlocking the door, she stepped into the familiar flat and twirled around with her arms in the air.
"Wow!" she exclaimed, walking from the entrance into the living room, "I can't believe I'm back. It looks so much like it did when I was younger. Well, except a tad bit smaller."
Esther chuckled. "It has been kept like this since your family visited years ago. Liz was always so particular about how it should look."
She followed Caroline to the living room before walking to one of the bedroom doors.
"This one is yours," she said while opening the door to reveal a large bedroom with a king sized bed in the center. "Your mother used to stay in this room as I'm sure you can remember. Niklaus will be in the next-door bedroom if you should need any help at all."
"The one that I used to share with my brothers?" Caroline asked to which Esther nodded.
She remembered how there were several bunk beds in that room but three of them used to try and fit on just one mattress to make it seem like a sleep over. A smile formed on her face, such good memories.
"Niklaus has already moved all his things in and has even took the liberty of putting your cases in your room when they arrived last week. He should arrive shortly and your bags should be up here soon, so take your time unpacking. I'd love to stay and catch up but I've got some business to settle."
Caroline waved her hand back and forth telling her not to worry about it. Her mother was always in such a rush to get to business meetings that she had gotten used to it over the years.
Esther turned to walk to the flat door. Before she exited, she turned around to face Caroline once again.
"It's good to have you back in the city, dear."
"It's good to be back."
7:58 a.m.
He still had 2 minutes to get to his mother's office before he was officially late.
Klaus entered the office building donned in a new suit, hair still damp from a shower. He made his way to the elevator but was stopped by Vicky when he walked near the front desk.
"Mr. Mikaelson," she called out to him, "Your mother has told me to inform you of the change in plans. Miss Forbes has arrived earlier this morning, and you are to go directly to the flat instead of her office."
Klaus' brows furrowed. What was she doing here already? He was supposed to pick her up at the airport in a couple of hours.
"Thank you, Vicky," he absentmindedly replied while making his way to the elevator.
"Oh Mr. Mikaelson!" she called out again and he turned to face her. "She also told me to tell you, 'Forewarning, don't forget our talk yesterday.'"
"Of course, she did," Klaus chuckled under his breath. His mother's warning meant that she already saw Caroline when she arrived and thought her pretty enough to remind him.
Didn't matter how beautiful she turned out to be. He doubted she would be able to hold a light to the woman from last night. He would definitely be able to use her image for the next couple weeks at the very least.
He pressed the button for the elevator. When it reached the 40th floor, he knocked on the door to the flat.
He had his own key but figured that since this was their first official meeting, it was best to wait for an answer just in case she found it rude that a man burst into her room.
"Come in!" said a muffled voice through the door. There was something familiar about the way it rang out, but he was too worried about how to greet the woman in the room to linger on it for long.
Unlocking the door, he opened it and stepped into the entrance. He took of his shoes and made his way into the connecting living room, following the shuffling of clothes coming from one of the bedrooms.
Stopping just outside the slightly ajar bedroom door, he introduced himself. "Good morning, Miss Forbes. My name is Niklaus Mikaelson. It is an honour to meet you."
Instead of hearing a response back, there was a loud clatter from inside the bedroom.
Without hesitation, Klaus swung the door open, ready to take out any intruder. Instead, his eyes settled on a woman with long cascading hair in the center of the room, a duffle bag lying at her feet.
It wasn't until she turned around that Klaus realized why her voice sounded so familiar.
"Bloody hell." The words slipped through his lips before he knew it. This couldn't be happening.
When she heard his voice, her hands fumbled the duffle bag she was trying to unpack. It went dropping to the floor with a loud bang.
Within seconds, her bedroom door went flying open and she stood still like a doe in headlights.
Her heart pounded loudly. It couldn't be him. There's no way, it wasn't possible. He just happened to have the exact same voice as that man. That had to be it, that was the only explanation because these types of situations only happened in the sappy movies she watched.
Before she could stop herself, she turned on her heel to confirm her thoughts.
She sucked in a breath when her eyes met deep greens that were wide with surprise. There stood in front of her was the man she was never supposed to meet again.
"Bloody hell," he said with that distinct British accent.
And she couldn't agree more. This was by far the most awkward meeting she had ever been a part of. She had ran into one night stands before but all she had to do was make small talk, lie about work, and slip away. But this, this was awkward.
It was like a movie script where your one night stand turned out to be your boss. Wait it was just like that, it was exactly like that. Except this time Klaus was the lady secretary being sexually harassed by her hot 30-year-old boss who happened to be addicted to whips and handcuffs.
They stayed frozen looking into each others surprised eyes for minutes, neither one of them breaking the tense silence. Suddenly, she saw Klaus' surprised expression morph into one of anger.
"What are you doing here, Care?" he spat.
Her face darkened and her eyes became serious. "You're better off reigning in that spiteful tone you're using, Mr. Mikaelson," she threatened in a voice that would have made Klaus proud had it been in different circumstances. "I have killed people for much less than talking to me as such."
"And so have I," he scowled. "Did you know who I was last night?" Boss or not, he had to know whether she knew his identity all along and intended to make a fool out of her new guard for the hell of it.
"Of course not, you preposterous man. Your files contain no photo. Though I should have connected the Klaus from last night to Niklaus. Goodness knows that name is a 1000 years old." She stepped closer to him and pointed a finger at his chest. "Is that always what you do? Jump to conclusions? Your not the only one thinking about how inconvenient this is."
Klaus reigned in his anger slightly when he saw the fire ignite in her baby blue eyes. He cursed himself when he felt his member begin to stir to life. This wasn't the time to get turned on, no matter how hot she looked when anger coursed through her veins.
She was right, he should have realized the names as well. It seemed she was just as surprised as he was.
Without a word, he walked out of the bedroom and towards the fully stocked bar. He needed a drink before he ended up smashing the furniture.
"What are you doing? It's 8 in the morning," Caroline asked as she followed him, not used to people just walking away from her during a conversation. She was still angry and wasn't done yelling at him yet.
Opting to ignore her presence for the moment, he took out two tumblers and poured a fare amount of scotch into both. Taking one in each hand, he extended one to her.
"I think this cosmic surprise earns us the right to drink before noon," Klaus drawled out. When Caroline still didn't budge, he continued to urge her, "Come on, love. If we're going to figure out how to get around this, we're going to need to be somewhat inebriated."
With a sigh, she succumbed to his charming smile and reached for the glass. One dimpled smile and her anger suddenly dissipated to make way for the feeling of annoyance. She wasn't annoyed at him, she was annoyed at how easily she went with his whim.
"So you're Niklaus?" Caroline said more to herself than to him as took a seat on one of the couches and practically downed the brown liquid.
He gave a curt nod and took a seat on the love seat across from her. Similarly, he took a healthy swig from the scotch and felt the liquid burn slightly as it went down his throat.
"What the hell am I going to do when my mother gets a whiff of this?"
She gave him a small smile. Never thought the rumoured cold-hearted assassin would be afraid of getting in trouble with his mama. "She's not going to," Caroline replied cooly.
Klaus raised a brow quizzically.
"Look," Caroline continued, "I'm only going to be on this mission for a couple of months if everything goes smoothly. There's no point of bringing Mama E and my mother, and not to mention my brothers into this. Damon and Stefan would hang you by your dick if they ever found out you touched me. So we keep this a secret. We never met last night. We never slept together. You're my guard and we are strictly professional from now on. Because I don't know what I'm going to do if-"
"Caroline," Klaus cut her off. He took a sip of his drink to hide the small smile on his lips. It was refreshing to see just how expressive she was.
A blush rose to her cheeks. "Sorry, I tend to rant when I'm freaking out."
Taking a deep breath, Caroline stood from her seat and took a few steps towards him. She decided to take the more tedious adult way instead of throwing a fit at the situation. "Let's start over, shall we?" she said while holding out her hand. "Caroline Forbes. Pleasure to meet you."
Mirroring her, Klaus stood and lightly grasped her hand. "Niklaus Mikaelson. Pleasure's all mine, love."
There was no use staying angry at something neither of them could have helped. Though, he was sure his mother would still find out one way or another. He was just left counting down the days to his inevitable doom.
They stood there hand in hand for longer than necessary before Caroline retracted hers and turned towards her bedroom. "Well now that that awkwardness is out of the way. I have some unpacking to do. Everything has to be in order before I start business."
She didn't bother to look to see if he was following her but could hear the creak of the floors under his feet. Picking up the discarded duffle bag from the floor, Caroline began to put away her cloths in the various cabinets.
Ten minutes of unpacking passed before she graced Klaus with another glance. He was leaning against door frame, arms crossed and eyes glued to her.
"Are you just going to stand there and watch, or are you going to give me a hand?" she asked, one hand on her hip.
He was a bodyguard, not a maid, but the look on her face made him smirk and bend to her whim. "Of course, love."
"Don't call me love"
"Of course, princess."
"Don't call me princess."
Klaus chuckled as he walked over to the heavy duty cases he had stacked in her room earlier that week. Seeing that there was a combination code, he waited until she walked over and entered it into all three cases.
He opened the lid of the the top case and was not surprised to see various weapons inside. Quickly unstacking the cases and flipping there lids, his eyes widened slightly when he realized that all three were filled with weapons organized by make and model. One case held small arms like revolvers and pistols, another held the disassembled parts of a sniper weapon, and the third held neat stacks of different coloured throwing knives.
The woman carried more weapons than he did. When he turned around to look at her, he had a hard time connecting the cases of weapons to the woman with the pageant-perfect hair.
Noticing him staring at her, Caroline immediately noticed what that look was. She had seen it far too many times on the her brothers' faces.
"Don't look at me like that," she scolded, "You need different weapons and designs to match with different mission and clothes. Just because all you do is snipe people from afar and wear only camo, doesn't mean that I do. It's really hard to conceal a weapon in women's clothing if it isn't designed properly."
He stood corrected. He knew he said that make up and weapons didn't mix, but clearly he was wrong about that. Rebecca also liked to accessorize, but it wasn't to this extent.
"They're weapons, love, not shoes. They don't need to match with colours."
Caroline scoffed and walked over to the closet opposite of the bed and swung it open. Inside were empty racks specifically designed to hold the fire arms.
"You sound just like Damon," she mumbled. Pointing around the closet she instructed him exactly where each piece should go.
Figuring it wasn't worth arguing with her, Klaus grabbed one of the revolvers and began to arrange them accordingly.
It was harder than she thought it was going go be. She thought she could just blatantly ignore him, but when he lived with her and worked with her, it was hard not to glance at his person and remember those strapping arms that lay under that pristine suit. It had been three days since they talked, and she slowly began to regret telling him to go back to being strictly professional.
During the day, she was thankful that work was so busy that she barely had time to look at his direction, and at home, she tried her best to avoid him unless otherwise necessary. If she stayed in the same room as him for too long, she was afraid that she may jump him. It really didn't help that the man was also completely unaware that he was the walking definition of sexy.
Even now, Caroline couldn't help but peek over at him as he stood to the side of her office doors. Ever so often he would pull at the base of his tie to loosen it and she would get a glimpse of the necklaces that he still wore underneath. Guess he wasn't very used to the confining suit. She remembered fiddling with those necklaces when they lain together after one of their bouts.
"It's rude to stare, love," an amused voice yanked her out of her fantasies.
She looked up to see a smirk on Klaus' face and an amused glint in his eyes. "I wasn't staring..." she mumbled, too embarrassed to think of a snappier comeback.
Looking back at the paper work on her desk, Caroline let out a large sigh. She had to focus on the task at hand. Scattered on the desk were files and flies of Kai's business dealings within the city and blue prints of storage buildings.
Her mission here was clear. Eliminate Kai and overthrow his organization. But, how she was going to do that was beyond her.
Kai was never a worry to her family until a couple of months ago when he hijacked a weapons delivery truck and almost killed the driver, Alaric, and his wife. Since then, he began pushing his luck and started buying out the trust of some of their business partners like the Lockwoods.
Caroline's mother took that as a declaration of war and sent her to fix it.
If she was going to determine the best course of action, she needed more insight into his personal routines and she knew just who to call up. Caroline whipped out her cell phone, looked through her contacts and pressed call. A smile grew on her face when she heard the phone connect and a woman answered on the other side.
"Elena!" she squealed into the phone and jumped out of her chair. She saw one of Klaus' eyebrows lift in question at her high-pitched screech but ignored him in favour of looking out onto the cityscape.
"Care!" the woman yelled on the other side, "It's been way too long! What's up?"
"I need some info on someone and thought you might be interested."
"Is this about your mission to take down Kai?"
"Is there anything you don't know?" Caroline laughed. "I'm starting to worry that my activities being too easy to follow."
"Oh you know me, I've got eyes and ears everywhere. And, ple-ase," Elena accentuated the word, "You jump all over the world over night. If I wasn't so good at being an informant, no one would ever know where you were."
"Well then, I'll assume you'll take the Kai job, Miss I-know-everything?"
"Leave it to me!" Elena responded excitedly. Caroline could already hear the sound of keyboard typing away. The girl enjoyed digging up dirt and concerning herself with other people's personal business a bit too much, but she was good at her job and that's all that mattered.
"Thank you. I'll assume you know which city I'm in right now, so I'll meet you here on Friday. We can have a girl's night."
She heard a chipper, "See you then!" before she hung up the call.
A smile was still on her face when she looked to up see Klaus still looking at her perplexed.
"What?" she snapped. She didn't do anything that would warrant the look.
Klaus walked towards her and only stopped when he was a few feet away from her, leaning on the mahogany desk. He continued to just stare at her for a few moments.
She was an enigma to him. For three days, she was like an emotional yo-yo. When they were at the office, she acted like his business-minded mother as she barked orders to workers, looked over files, and planned her actions. She barely gave him a glance when she was concentrated and only spoke to him when she needed to go outside of the office.
Then they got back home and suddenly she was the wild woman he first met, though he had an itching feeling that she was avoiding him most of the time. During dinner, which was one of the rare times he would see her, her sassy comments would be the only retort to his conversation starters. He didn't remember what he thought it would be like to live the boss's daughter, but he knew that this was not it.
Even now, he was confounded when the sexy business woman suddenly spoke like a gossiping teenager over her phone.
"You, love," he drawled, "Are completely different from what I thought the Forbes Princess would be."
Caroline crossed her arms over her chest, taking a slow step towards him as she spoke. "What? Did you think I would be a silly, shallow blonde? Or did you think I would be dark and brooding all the time?" She leaned on the table in front of him, mirroring his pose.
A smirk formed on Klaus' lips. His free arm maneuvered and landed on the other side of body, trapping her between the desk and his body. He looked into her blue eyes and saw the attraction and hesitation in them.
"I have found that you are so much more than either of those descriptions. Caroline, you are larger than life and shine brightly everywhere you go. A simple life was something that never occurred to you. You wanted adventure, excitement, danger and to see the beauty of the world. And now you have all these things. You built a life for yourself that you are proud of," he paused for a second, "But, regardless of all of this, you want even more. A partner to share it all with. Am I right, sweetheart?"
He watched as her eyes widened and her teeth clenched. He had hit right on the ball, but her stubbornness dictated that she would deny it regardless.
"You've only known me for a couple of days. You don't know anything about me," she stated through clenched teeth. This had escalated way too quickly. She didn't like to be read so easily and especially by the infuriating man. He always acted like he knew everything. Maybe it was the British accent, they always made people sound more official.
A chuckled was ripped out of Klaus' throat and he moved his head closer to her neck, his breath tickling her. "I beg to differ, love." He placed a chaste kiss on her pulse and felt it jump under his lips. "This says I'm right on the dot."
Caroline's hands formed fist. She wanted to slug him so badly, but the softness of his lips on her neck brought up sinful memories that made her core pulse. She hated how pompous he was, but she hated herself even more for loving it. She had to be sick to react like this.
"This isn't very professional, Klaus."
A hint of a smirk could be felt against her skin. "You were the only one who agreed to going back to being professional, love. I never said a word. After tasting you, I was already marked for hell anyways. No point denying myself what's already in front of me."
When he lifted his head, Caroline swallowed hard when she saw that his eyes had darkened with lust. If this continued, she wouldn't mind being dragged to hell with him.