A/N: Hard to believe, but this has been written for a month now. Consider this chapter the cool period. Enjoy.

iii

Morning light filtered through the diaphanous cream curtains. Bonnie turned her head, exhaling deep into the pillow. Cotton and aloe vera and…vetiver? She cracked open an eye.

"Good morning, darling."

Bonnie wiped her eyes and when the vision didn't change, she sat up. Klaus lay propped up by the headboard. He wore a gray suit and his face was clean shaven. He watched her with the same kind of knowing he treated everything. Someone less experienced with Klaus would be in a frightened panic, but Bonnie merely stretched and fell back against the headboard.

Klaus reached out to tuck a strand behind her ear.

"I've been worried."

Bonnie spread her hands. "I'm right here, perfectly fine."

He folded his hands on a pillow. His blue eyes regarded her with warmth, his shapely mouth a grin. The loathsome aspects of his character had no bearing on his attractiveness. All the most terrible creatures were somehow the most beautiful. It must be nature's way of inculcating suspicion of too good of a thing.

"How was the sale of the family home?"

Bonnie remembered the cover story then. She reached for her phone and checked her email. The broker processed the sale of the house as she directed. The house that had been in escrow for five years was now on the market as of midnight. Bonnie showed Klaus. He nodded, impressed.

"So the broker gave you no trouble then. That's good. All your loose ends seem to be," he linked his hands, "coming together."

"And what loose end brings you to Richmond?" Bonnie asked.

"An ongoing affair. One that has me extremely worried."

Bonnie blinked. "Oh?"

"Oh?" Klaus mimicked. He ran a finger down her jaw line. "I know about him."

"About who?"

Klaus frowned. "Bonnie, dear, when will you learn? I've got eyes everywhere, especially on you. You're my left hand, my might, my lovely, lovely, little piece. It's my business to know all about you. Why wouldn't I know who you're fucking?"

Bonnie looked to the window. She threw off the comforter and stood in the weak sun rays. She felt his eyes on her ass. Klaus could easily do away with the flimsy camisole and lace panty she wore. She turned to face him. His eyes ran over her body.

"I don't belong to you," Bonnie said.

Klaus moved with vampire quickness to stand in front of her. "If you need, come to me. After all we've done together, why not that?" He stroked her arm. "Why not this?"

Klaus kissed her for the first time in a darkened club, in the middle of gyrating bodies. It startled her, not because it was Klaus and she detested him, but because it was full of longing and pleasurable. Kissing him then made sense. They were intoxicated and they were powerful, and there was an attraction neither could deny. The conditions were right and for all intents and purposes, it made sense to enter into a relationship with the one person she hated more than herself. But when the kiss ended and she saw herself in his eyes, an overwhelming pity crashed her senses. It sobered her. Here was a man so desperate for intimacy, he would turn to a witch who wanted to kill him more than help him. A witch who could never love him or tend to the tenderness in him, cultivate it so it could transform him.

He kissed her then and she despaired. Five years later, nothing had changed. The longing, the pity, the strange realization, nothing. Bonnie let his lips work hers, played the Sleeping Beauty to his Prince. He pressed her close, her toes touching the ground, arms loose. Bonnie bided the time. Soon he became aware of her lack of passionate intensity. And like that first time, he acted as though scalded. Bonnie dropped to her feet while he recoiled, anger drawing his face in tight.

"I thought you had better taste than to spread your legs for that asshole canker."

Bonnie only smiled. "I don't. And I'm not screwing him for his conversation, Klaus, or for love. I'm screwing him because he doesn't expect anything more than a few fucks a year and a guarantee he'll live a little longer."

"I should kill him," he said.

"Go ahead. I'll just find someone else."

Klaus glared at her. "And I'll kill him too."

"Wait," Bonnie paused, "if that someone else turns about to be you, you'd kill yourself? If that's the case," she jumped onto the bed and leaned back on her elbows. "You want?" she crossed and uncrossed her legs.

Klaus stormed out of the bedroom. Bonnie put her head back and laughed.

"Shut up and come out here," he said. He reappeared with a robe. "And put this on. I'm tired of looking at what I can't have."

The silk robe landed over her legs. Bonnie put it on. She heard him in the front room, talking to someone. There was a clink of dishes and the smell of coffee. She took a moment to let the panic she controlled since she woke seize her. She gripped the sheets. The skin of her knuckles drew taut. What was he doing here? Had he always been here? If he had known about Elena, she would know immediately, wouldn't she? And how did he know she was sleeping with someone? And why would he think it was Damon?

Questions swelled the more she tried to find answer. Klaus called her again. Bonnie straightened. She counted out her breaths until they were even and steady. There was no way he suspected. Nothing was amiss. Calm down, go out there, and act.

Klaus sat an upholstered chair, a breakfast cart before him. It was a nice spread of scones, crepes, biscuits with currant jam, strips of bacon, fluffy eggs, and fruit compote. A metal dome stood in the center. She whisked it off and there was a bowl of granola and a jug of milk.

"Because you are child," he said.

Bonnie thanked him and prepared her bowl of cereal. She sat across from him on the matching couch.

"I hope you didn't come all the way to Richmond for a rejection," Bonnie said.

"Don't flatter yourself, sweetheart." Klaus folded the newspaper. He bit into an apricot and cream scone. "The doppelganger has disappeared."

He announced it so casually. Bonnie left the spoon in the cereal. Klaus gazed at her while he finished the scone. He was daring her to claim she didn't know. Bonnie picked up the spoon and ate a mouthful of soggy granola. Her appetite had fled but she chewed and swallowed.

"I know."

Klaus brushed the crumbs from his lap. "You should have told me."

"So you could embroil yourself in another mini war? I'm tired of destroying towns and killing people when it could be avoided."

"How noble of you. Let me guess, you were going to formulate some sort of plan, fix the whole thing, stick a bow on it, something of that sort?"

"No. I was going to give it three days and if I found her, no harm, no foul. If not, then," she shrugged.

Klaus considered her words. "You're not lying."

"No need to lie."

"Is there anything else I should be made aware of?"

Bonnie ate another spoonful. "No," she said.

Klaus took a bacon strip. "Are you sure?"

Bonnie sighed. "I'm sure your dog told you everything," she said.

"Stefan hates it when you refer to him as a dog. He gets touchy and I have to call you my bitch to level the field."

Bonnie gripped the spoon. Stefan had followed her from Las Vegas. She put another spoonful in her mouth to choke out the fury. What was she thinking to trust him? He had proved time and again how changeable he could be, what made this time different? Bonnie remembered the card in her bedroom. He didn't want lightning to strike him once, let alone twice.

Klaus grinned and ate the bacon. "I am just teasing you. The sale of your house seems to be a portentous event."

Bonnie frowned. "Is there something I should be made aware of?"

"Ah, now she starts asking the questions," Klaus said. "Elena isn't a priority anymore."

Bonnie set the bowl aside. She knew better than to take this sudden reversal of urgencies at face value.

"Then what is?"

"Shoring up my assets. I have enough hybrids, enough wealth, and enough family. I have everything I want," Klaus pursed his lips. "Well, almost everything."

"You're so dramatic. What is it?"

"You."

"Well if I'm the new priority, you better refocus your attention to harassing Elena." Bonnie crossed her arms. "We will never happen."

"I think you like to be contrary just for the sake of it," Klaus said. He stood and withdrew an envelope from his inner suit pocket. "Rebekah neglected to send you an invitation to her gala of self-importance."

Bonnie stared at him, incredulous. "Are you kidding me right now? Elena is missing."

Klaus tossed the envelope on the couch cushion next to her. "I am aware."

"So what are the directives? Seek and destroy? Torture the five people she has left?"

"If that's what you feel is best."

"You're leaving this up to me," Bonnie said. She frowned. This was unexpected.

"Let us be practical, Bonnie, for once. Elena will never cooperate. She's run off, no doubt on a mission to slay me," Klaus stooped before her, "but I have you, my sword, and Stefan, my shield. I will acquiesce to whatever you decide."

Bonnie gazed into his blue eyes. They had all the gilded trappings of honesty, but she knew how easy the truth sounded from a liar's mouth. Klaus gave her the illusion of freedom, just as she provided him with a false sense of loyalty. The question always came down to which door to choose, which lie to believe.

"If it turns out to be nothing, then I'll do nothing."

Klaus grimaced. "Nothing? For disobedience?"

Bonnie ignored him. "If it is something, then I'll send her by way of her brother."

"Why not kill her?"

"Because she isn't gunning for me, darling," Bonnie said in his affected drawl.

Klaus patted her knee and straightened. "Very astute." He buttoned the suit jacket. "I'll be in New York a few days. Call me if you have any leads." He took her hand. "I'm feeling very noir right now. Care to be my femme fatale for an evening?"

Bonnie grinned. "You are relentless."

Klaus watched her for a moment. "Have you heard of William Blake? Great man, completely insane?"

"'Tiger, tiger burning bright…'" Bonnie intoned.

"Yes. Whenever I am faced with a particularly hard choice, I think of what he said."

"And that is?"

"It is easier to forgive an enemy than it is a friend."

Klaus dropped a chaste kiss on her knuckles. "I'll be seeing you soon."

Her eyes followed him out the door and lingered on the cream paneling long after it had shut.

The forecast said a sixty-percent chance of rain. Bonnie looked at the sky. Gray clouds billowed out from the east. In the distance a lone flash of brilliance cracked the gray dome. This was the kind of weather tailored for rumination. She took a turn about the room, sat on the couch, lolled around the bed. Her body refused to settle. Restless, she pulled on soft leather boots and a light pea coat, wrapped a scarf around her neck, slung her purse across her chest and left the hotel.

Fat drops splattered the pavement five minutes into her walk. She set off at a brisk pace up Cary Street. Perhaps she should have gone on to the slip, but the walk would have been short, and she needed the cold, wet air a while longer. The drops came faster, forcing her into a boutique of odd little knick-knacks, most of them geared towards tourists. Fortunately, they sold umbrellas. Bonnie purchased the least of the ridiculous, a Victorian-inspired black parasol, and stepped once more into the rain, now deluge.

She glanced at her watch. It would take a good hour to reach Carytown in the rain and under the burden of her thoughts. Bonnie ambled past darkened shops and cafes, past trees with blackened and bare limbs. She walked sightless. The rain pattering on the black canopy and the rhythm of walking lulled her into a meditative trance.

It is easier to forgive an enemy than it is a friend. No shit. Forgiveness for her was out of the question. To be an enemy, that is something of an isolated incident. But to be a friend turned nemesis caused a ripple effect through the pool of time. Every memory, every incident prior to that one act of treachery became tainted. Happy times turned to vinegar. Indolent days watching the world through blades of grass or through each other's fingertips crumbled to dust. Nothing mattered once a heart is irrevocably shattered. Nothing existed except the absence.

In the days and weeks after Bonnie left with Klaus, the pain immobilized her. The night replayed over and over. Sounds and smells were amplified. The taste of dark magic thickened her tongue and made her blood sing a language she never heard. At night it all pressed upon her, followed her into the daylight and haunted her steps. It crippled her. And it would have crippled her still if not for Stefan.

Bonnie stepped over a puddle. Stefan was a padlocked door behind a barbed wire fence behind an inflamed mote. He frustrated her plans, upset her desires, made it impossible to think clearly. He was a distraction in her head. Bonnie veered away from the name on her tongue and circled back to the crux of all problems.

Elena had to be found. That much was certain. Bonnie struggled with what to do once that happened. She weighed her options to find there was none but one available: death. Elena would continue to be a viable threat as long as she lived. Klaus was in a forgiving mood now, but should a few hybrids end up dead or missing or, God forbid, free, he would expect blood and fire. She needed to prepare for that possibility. Klaus would kill her one remaining loved one without notice, without pause. Her family was virtually eradicated in service to the Gilbert family. Would she risk Alaric in order to appease some shred of lingering loyalty to Elena? Could she even do it?

Lightning split the sky. Sound collapsed around her ears. Bonnie glanced up to see an even darker ridge of clouds rolling in from the west. Perhaps she could spend the day sequestered in her room. Room service could provide anything she might want and her mind needed the passivity of telenovela viewing.

Bonnie slowed the severity of the storm until she returned to The Jefferson. She stood in the lobby with a valet and watched the rain wash the world to gray. It sounded like a river rushing loose through the woods, snapping and pitching trees. This display of pure nature appealed to the witch she used to be. She wanted to run out and be the rain, be the wind and the trees, be bent and snapped. Her vision of the storm became refracted and shiny. Bonnie turned in one abrupt movement and left the vision behind.

She took the elevator to the fifth floor and walked down the hall to her suite. She sighed as she searched her pockets for the key card. Her fingers brushed plastic as a shadow fell across the doorway. Bonnie looked up knowing it was him. It was always him.

Her heart beat slowed as her eyes fell on his face. She forgot the key card. It had been almost two days since she used his body as a cover. Those two days vanished as they gazed at each other, silent, alone.

His murky eyes stared into hers. She wanted to lurk in his shifting eyes for a while. She wanted to dive deep and lose touch. He moved closer or she did or he drew them together—Bonnie was never sure of how they moved when alone. All she was sure of was the weight of his arm against her back and the firmness of his lips on hers, and the sense of finality when she tasted coffee and peppermint gum.

He gripped her tight and they melted through the door. The suite was the same overcast shade as the sky. Bonnie pulled him into a pool of deep blue shadows. She kissed him past all breath, and only stopped when her body trembled for oxygen.

She unbuttoned her coat and toed off her boots. He followed shirt for shirt, jeans for jeans, undergarment for undergarment until they were naked, the storm playing on their skin. They looked at each other like land on the horizon. Each passing second Bonnie became more aware of his effect on her. Blood rushed to her skin in waves, running from warm to hot to blistering. She was slick all over, moist and aching, and all he did was stand within arm's reach. Being a vampire he didn't sweat, and his skin remained the same even tone, but his eyes were heavy and his mouth slightly apart and his fingers curled in. His erection drew her eyes. She thought of the blood it took to feed it, blood not belonging to him. It quivered. His stare grew dense and his breathing shallow.

Bonnie pointed to the couch. He sat without taking his eyes from her. She stepped between his open legs and straddled him. The tip his erection pushed against her lips. She swallowed all that engorged flesh in a slow descent. He released a breath that shook them both. She rolled her hips and watched the sharp angles of his face and the block of shadows that were his eyes, watched his hands light on her sides and circle around to grip her buttocks. He surged up as he brought her forward. She braced her hands on the couch as they moved, rotating and driving. His lips touched her neck and she sank against him. Her hands left the fabric of the couch to grip the fabric of his shoulders. His lips wandered over veins and arteries of her throat, along the exposed collarbone, down to her breasts and then back up, all the while grinding his hips against hers.

She breathed harder. Uneven gasps broke the sounds of rhythmic pounding. She closed in on that elastic band of pleasure, felt it tightening to an acute point of implosion. She was aware of being pulled back, then saw him, then him above her, and beyond him the ceiling and the inclement sky. The sensation of his body, hot and slick like her own, pressed along the lengths and curves of her flesh and skin forced the climax nearer. She hooked a leg around his waist and rose with greater urgency. She felt his eyes on her face and looked into them. For the first time she saw how they changed, from gray to a startling green then to some kind of variegated brown. She saw her own desire gazing back, her own need magnified by an emotion known only to those who have craved. He looked into her face and in a moment of unguarded passion, she saw how deep this emotion ran. It called to her across a distance of minds, a vastness of souls. It called to her, desperate. She looked away with a cry of pleasurable anguish. She came with her face inside his neck, his scent all around, her hand against the dull thrum of his heart.

The insensate period passed in quiet. Bonnie shifted under his weight to alert him to move, but he remained on top of her. She relaxed and let her arm trail down his back. She grabbed his ass and smiled when he nipped her shoulder. He rolled off to lay along the inside of the couch, one arm behind his head. Bonnie rested her head on the muscle of his arm and breathed in the silence.

"What happened here?" He stroked the bite marks of her neck.

"I stepped between a werewolf and your brother."

"Why would you do that?"

"Because…" Bonnie shrugged. "Because your brother was worth more alive at that moment than dead."

Stefan arched a brow. "A straight answer. I thought it was impossible."

"Impossible for you, not for me." Bonnie took his hand and placed it on a breast. He palmed it then ran an idle thumb over the nipple, back and forth.

"I was furious with you," Bonnie said.

"You had a wonderful way of showing it."

"You could have told me you were here."

"If I did that, I wouldn't know as much as I know now." Stefan slid his hand down her stomach. "It is much harder to lie than it is to omit."

Bonnie gripped his wrist before he went further south. "So you know everything." She looked into his face. The distance settled between them once again. Bonnie dropped his hand and got up. "I wonder sometimes about the games we play. If we should stop them."

"Why would we stop something mutually beneficent?"

Bonnie pulled on her underwear. "It's not mutual if it benefits only you."

She dressed in silence. His eyes followed her movements. Bonnie had forgotten her anger, but it returned like heat returning slow to water.

"I need you to leave. It's earlier than usual, but you are irritating the hell out of me."

Stefan sighed and swung his legs to the floor. "Talk to me."

"Talk to you about what you already know?" Bonnie walked away to the bedroom. She went into the bathroom to splash cool water on her hot cheeks. When she looked up, he was there in the mirror, dressed, an impeccably cool, fuckable shadow.

"I asked you to give me time."

"Klaus wanted to find you. I volunteered. In that instance, I saved you without your permission. I'm sorry."

He stepped into the bathroom. "And you irritate me too, much more than you know. I can't seem to leave you alone."

Bonnie took her eyes off him. "That's because we've let this go on too long. Klaus knows."

"The Damon story. " Stefan grinned. "It must be true since it's so ludicrous."

"I never gave him any indication that, well," Bonnie paused. "What led him to suspect?"

"You started to smoke. And you weren't answering your phone. And you lost some of that playful seriousness he loves about you."

Bonnie shifted. That word bothered her. It was too well chosen, and he spoke it softly. She didn't like how closely she was watched. Her habits were supposed to pass unnoticed, but Klaus had his attention on her. This was useful to know.

"I'll stop smoking then. And answer my phone. And be more playfully serious." Bonnie unzipped a makeup bag. She fixed her eyes on Stefan. "Anything else?"

"Have you eaten?"

Stefan took her to a brassiere in Carytown. They sat near the window, warmed by the yellow lights, the smell of bread, and the prospect of good food. She perused the menu while Stefan glanced at it once and ordered. Bonnie warded of any conversation by focusing on the cheese plate or the graying street or her steak. Her mind was back in Mystic Falls as she ate, questioning memories.

She put the events up till then in order. There was the phone call, coming home, visiting the boarding house, finding Damon and Lorel, the attack in her bedroom, Klaus, and then this…Bonnie glanced at Stefan. He caught her eye over a glass of wine. One dark eyebrow rose. She picked up a fry but didn't eat it. Stefan was a proven distractor, yes, but he was also a great mind, and she needed insight. She had overlooked something.

"Elena sold the house."

Stefan nodded. "Yes, she put it on the market when she was accepted to Duke."

"Damon and Alaric searched her apartment in Durham, found nothing. She came back to Mystic Falls though, every so often."

"She stayed at the boarding house."

Bonnie frowned. "Did she? Alaric didn't mention that. And I saw zero signs of Elena ever staying there."

"She had to live somewhere during summer."

Bonnie stared at him without seeing him. Elena had been planning for years. She wouldn't be stupid enough to leave anything at the boarding house or her apartment in Durham. She would go somewhere from the past, somewhere no one would think she would go. Somewhere no one wanted to go.

The waiter came to ask about dessert.

"No, the check please," Bonnie interrupted.

"I wanted a coffee, actually," Stefan said.

Bonnie quirked her lips. "We'll stop at Starbucks on the way."

"On the way to…?"

"Mystic Falls. I have business with the dead."