She'd laughed at him and flipped him onto his back in the debris. "Oh I plan to break something way older than that"

He'd laughed too. "Is that so? Well come on then love, give it your best shot"

She'd failed of course, just as she'd known she would, the well of his power is too deep for a baby like her to exhaust but god knows it was fun trying and when he'd carried her exhausted to his bed and laid her down on the soft cotton with his smell all around she'd found she'd had just enough of her own strength left to spoon against him in wiggling invitation.

He'd held her tightly to his chest with one slim powerful arm around her waist and gently fucked the last of her fear away into exhausted oblivion. "Caroline" he'd incanted her name against the damp skin of her shoulder. "My love"

She wakes with the sun approaching its apex and that murmured endearment fresh in her mind. She had thought love was supposed to be epic, Stephan and Elena, falling from the moment they met, fighting the whole world side by side for their destined togetherness.

Elena had shattered her illusions when she'd chosen Damon. When she'd chosen a wild reckless stupid love over that perfect fated one. She'd hated it. Hated Elena just a little for throwing away so easily what she herself had dreamed of since she'd first watched Disney's Cinderella, a prince charming all of her own.

But perhaps the most epic love isn't the one you fight for but the one you can't fight against. She'll admit to herself in this moment, and this moment only, that she loves him. That she is resigned to loving him in a way that doesn't fit at all with her juvenile romantic fantasies but perhaps in a way she's coming to see the merit of. After all if she still can't shake him after everything he's done that's got to mean something.

She watches his sleeping features, enjoying the weight of his arm over her stomach and the warmth of his limbs tangled with her. He's gorgeous; she'll give him that. Maybe not in a GQ cover kind of way; his stubble is a little too scruffy and a good deal too ginger for that, his lips too feminine in their pink fullness. Nose not straight she thinks, while she's listing his faults, kinda weird bumps on his brow.

Her eyes trail over his pale chest, bit skinny in an athletic kind of way. Too much body art. The birds are ok if you like that kind of thing but the big cat is just piss ugly, he must have been drunk.

"Hello love" His voice startles her, blushing, out of inner critique of his looks. His eyes open and his imperfections twinkle into assets. His full lips are exquisitely kissable, his slight frame a perfect fit for her slender figure and she think she could trace the flight of those birds over his pale skin with her lips all day long. Yeah she was right the first time he is gorgeous in every way, but mostly in his dancing eyes.

"Hello" she replies dumbly the way lovers do just to be talking to each other. Then she ducks her head and snuggles in close. She feels alive, connected to herself. She'd thought to keep herself she'd had to hold tight, turns out she'd had to let go.

She's not ready to let reality in just yet. She feels like they're children hiding in a tree house on a summer afternoon, lost in fantasy and imagination. She feels light and free and only in the corner of her mind does she acknowledge that this feeling is temporary.

A long road lies ahead of her, she'll have to come to terms with what she's done and what she's lost and it's going to suck beyond the telling of it she knows that. She'll need her friends if she's to survive it and she thinks she'll be able to let them in now. Now that he has shown her that she is still Caroline Forbes, still the strong, jealous, forgiving, loving girl she always was, the girl they love.

She wants to tell him thank you but how do you even begin to word that sort of ethereal gratitude. He hasn't saved her and he won't fix her, only she can do that for herself, but he's set her on the path and for that she needs to find a way to thank him.

Her body comes alive with the temptation of thanking him in the oldest way a woman can thank a man and she runs her foot invitingly up the back of his calf and all the way up until her thigh hooks over his hip. Her hands delve into his already sweetly tousled hair and her eyes sparkle with cheeky invitation.

"Mr Mikaelson" she says formally. "I don't believe I've properly thanked you for your hospitality."

His lips twitch and he picks up the game. So much endured, so much blood split and still so playful. "My lady it was my honour to offer you the shelter of my humble home. I would not see a lady turned on to the streets for I have heard dark tales of monsters that roam the night and feed on human blood"

She widens her eyes comically and gasps. "I should be so afraid" she hams it up and fake swoons back onto the bed. "Whoever shall protect me?"

With a flash of his hybrid speed he's above her and he's not playing anymore, his eyes are dark and intense. "I will always protect you Caroline," he tells her earnestly, his eyes burning into hers and scorching his absolute seriousness onto her brain.

His declaration makes her shake. It's impossible and it's inevitable and above all it's true and that terrifies her. She can't allow herself to melt into his protection, she's not ready and she has to find her own way. So she scoffs and rolls her eyes and doesn't look to see the disappointment flash in his.

She lifts her head off the pillow to press her lips to his and he kisses her back light and feathery so she has to chase his lips higher and higher to get enough of him until she sitting up and he's on his knees between her legs, head ducked to kiss her, their bodies excruciatingly distant.

She knows what he's doing, insecure narcissistic prick that he is, he's making her come to him. He feels rejected so now he wants to be in control, well tough she's not about to be part of any stupid sexual power play not when they've been so close, so intimate. Not when his pledge has just made her belly dance with butterflies even if she can't show him that just yet. So she leans back on her elbows and glowers at him. "Seriously?" she asks in an exasperated tone and tells him with her expression that she's on to him and she's not impressed.

For a second his jaw clenches and she sees a spark of that signature anger he carries with him always. It's easy to forget when he's being all sweet and sexy just how much of an arsehole he can be sometimes.

"I mean it Klaus" she looks at him sternly for a long moment then softens deliberately and reaches for him. "Don't ruin this, ok"

One more flash of anger in his eyes and he relents, presses her back onto the mattress and mumbles "Sorry" into her hair.

She giggles softly, "Niklaus Mikaelson apologises? Now I really am afraid"

"Oh I'm quite capable of contrition love," he tells her with rakish smirking charm. "When it suits my nefarious purposes"

"Ooh nefarious" her hands bury in his hair and she undulates her body invitingly under his. "My day just got interesting"

With that he brings her lips down onto hers and her hands begin dance over his chest and shoulders as his reacquaint themselves with the bare skin of her hips and thighs. "Caroline" he murmurs appreciatively into her mouth and she swallows her own name tasting his devotion on her tongue.

One day, she thinks as she loses her mind to his touch, she'll come back. When she's all fixed up and mended, she'll come back like a scorching desert sun to illuminate the darkest corners of his soul and leave no place for his weakness and his wickedness to hide.

He grabs her waist and in one powerful effortless movement flips their position so he's beneath her with her knees are on the pillows and his sinful mouth on her sex, teasing and tasting. Perhaps she'll leave a little bit of wickedness just for herself after all.

Eventually she begs. He takes her close with his fingers and tongue over and over again. He brings her to the edge and denies her until she doesn't know or care if he's playing her. If he's exerting his dominance or making a point he can consider it made. "Please, God, Klaus please" she moans for the umpteenth time, each time more desperate than before. "Just please, I need, oh God"

She swears she feels him smile at her incoherence before he bites down lightly on her clit and curls his fingers inside her. She hisses and grinds herself against him as he sucks her hard and flicks his tongue over her. She falls apart above him. "Jesus" she keens as she feels herself exiting the world for a moment as the force of her orgasm crashes chaotically around her body.

She's still coming as he flips them and pushes into her shuddering pussy. The feel of him stretching her is more than she can bear and when he drives deep into her and grinds against her buzzing clit she shakes her head and tries to squirm away from the intensity of it but he holds her down with on hand on her shoulder and one on her hip and looks into her eyes as he pushes into her with a slow and deep rhythm, kisses her neck and breast and lips and between those kisses tells her on repeat that she is beautiful, powerful, kind. She lays back, closes her eyes and lets him pour his love into her, absorbs it through her skin, and channels it into her embattled heart. She is loved, she hears him say with every touch and kiss, she is loved and she is worthy of love. She could cry but instead she smiles, runs her hands over his back and lets him love her.

….

By the time he's done with her she feels light and drowsy. Warmly cocooned in his image of her.

In a distant part of the compound she hears a voice, a woman's and oddly familiar, singing a lullaby softly. Haley, she thinks, singing to the baby. The cocoon shatters and she's ashamed of how easily she'd come to him for herself when she hadn't been able to come to him for him.

A faint soft cry catches his attention and his face lights with something unassumingly beautiful and tender. He smiles inwardly and she feels terrible. "I tried to come," she blurts out and he frowns his lack of understanding.

"When we heard that your baby died" she clarifies and his frown deepens. "I actually got as far as Charlotte but I wimped out and turned back. I just didn't know what I'd say." She can't look at him she feels so wretched. "I must have brought your number up on my phone like a thousand times but I never hit call, then before we knew it we heard she didn't, you know, die and… I'm sorry"

He tugs her close and kisses her hair. "Don't worry about it love"

"Seriously?" she feels perversely indignant at his easy acceptance of her lack of compassion and pulls away to look at him. "Don't worry about it?"

He shrugs. "I hadn't expected you to come"

"That doesn't make it ok. God! Friends are supposed to be there for you when bad stuff happens, you should have been able to expect me to come"

"Are we friends then?" he asks looking ridiculously hopeful considering he spent the night fucking her six ways from Sunday and the last hour turning her into Jello-Caroline.

She smiles. "I guess." She shrugs a little playfully, trying to forget her own inadequacies. "If we're not I need to have a serious talk with myself about who I'm willing to sleep with. Because that would make this kinda slutty"

"I don't mind slutty" he plays along and kisses her shoulder with no real intent. Then he looks up at her from under his lashes in a boyish bashful way that does things to her heart she can't examine too closely right now. "You wanna meet her?"

She hesitates a second too long and she sees him regret asking and rushes to reassure him that he hasn't said the wrong thing. "I'd love too" She assures him and then by way of explanation for her hesitation. "Do I have to see Haley too though?"

He laughs. "Haley's not so bad"

"If you say so," she retorts cattily, she should leave it but she's never been that kind of girl. "I'll take your word for it that she's grown out of her boyfriend stealing, hybrid killing, were-slut phase"

He chuckles "were-slut?" he asks clearly amused by her bitchiness

"It's a word" she defends. "And it's true. She was pretty much throwing herself at every eligible were-wolf or hybrid in Mystic falls wasn't she?" she gives him an accusing look. "At least Tyler had the decency not to actually sleep with her"

Her tirade, or rather the overt jealousy behind it, pleases him and he raises both eyebrows. "Well I wasn't actually your boyfriend if you recall"

She huffs. "I still don't get what possessed you"

"Half a bottle of whisky and a very low cut blouse" he shrugs and looks at her mischievously. "For all her faults Haley does have an impressive p-"

"Lets go" she cuts him off and leaps out of bed to the sound of his teasing laughter.

…..

Hope is so beautiful. All babies are supposed to be beautiful but she's seen some shockers over the years, one of her mom's friends once brought round a thing that looked a lot like a steamed pudding. But Hope is actually gorgeous, with her dark otherworldly gaze and her mother's soft olive skin.

No matter how much she's despised Haley over the years or how awkward their greeting just was she finds she can turn to the young hybrid with absolute sincerity. "Haley she's lovely, congratulations"

Haley beams. Like all mothers she can forget any personal dislike for someone who is willing to praise her offspring. "Thanks." Haley turns to Klaus. "Jackson just went for lunch and a beer with some of the pack, can you watch her while I go join them, just for an hour"

He nods and Haley transfers Hope into his arms and lays a kiss on her forehead. "She's probably due a nap, if you put her in the pram she'll drop off" she says and he nods again not taking his eyes off his daughter.

"She shouldn't need a bottle, but if she cries, just call me and…"

"Don't fret little wolf" he looks up and cuts Haley off in an affectionate brotherly tone that surprises her. Seems the co-parenting thing is going better than you'd imagine. "Caroline and I will take good care of her"

Haley relaxes and leaves, much to her relief, and she takes a moment to watch the Original cradle his daughter tenderly. "Anyone capable of love" she'd told him once. "Is capable of being saved."

He's all love right now and she realises she doesn't have to be the one to save him. His love for his daughter is huge in the room, dwarfing even his love for her; a love she'd thought was pretty monumental itself. She's more than okay with that, she might be a touch neurotic and decidedly insecure at times but even she understands that kids come first. Especially impossible miracle babies born a thousand years after you've given up the idea of ever being a father.

"May I?" she asks holding out her arms and he looks pleased that she'd want to. She coos girlishly over Hope for a while and avoids looking at Klaus whose gaze feels too warm for comfort. She's still basically a wreck, grieving and guilt-ridden and only just now seeing a speck of light at the end of the tunnel. A light Klaus Mikaelson of all people has shown her, which she supposes means its pretty dam likely to turn out to be a train.

When Hope falls asleep in her pram, she realises with a sinking dread that its time to leave. She has hours of driving ahead of her and classes to attend. Her friends don't even know where she is, they'll want and explanation and that thought makes her sigh loudly.

He reads her mind. "Time to go then love?"

She nods and looks ruefully at him. "Yeah." Another heavy sigh, going home shouldn't feel this dismal. "I guess"

He doesn't ask her to stay, doesn't even move to kiss her goodbye as she stands awkwardly to leave, so she kisses him instead, lightly on the cheek. "Bye"

"Goodbye sweetheart"

She feels like there are things to say, there must be. She came here lost and he found her, she came here desperate and he steadied her, wild and he soothed her. She must have more for him than this. But the words are hiding and she can only search for them for so long before standing silently in front him becomes ridiculous. So she bites her lips and turns to go and he lets her damn him. He just watches her go, doesn't he feel something, want something from her before she walks out of his life?

She keeps thinking he'll call her back but he doesn't, she feels his eyes watch her walk the short endless journey to the door without a word. She turns the handle and glances back at him with a tight smile. He looks so tragically resigned that she suddenly finds her words and wonders why she thought them illusive, she has after all been waiting to tell him this for two years.

"Klaus" he whispers knowing he'll hear. "I intend to be your last too. I just don't know how long it will take"

He smiles then, slow and crooked and guilelessly endearing. Then he nods and tips his head. "I have forever"

She doesn't smile back, she just turns away without another word or look. She doesn't need to linger on this goodbye, they will see each other again soon enough, even if it takes decades, they are immortal and it will be soon enough.

In the car she puts on country music and lets herself go. Sings along loudly and cries at the clichéd sentimentality of it. The journey back to Whitmore is long but she's begun it now and with it the journey back to herself and ultimately back to him. There's no hurry; the wheels are already turning and she has forever too.

Fin

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