Author's Note:
It's been a while. *shuffles guiltily* Life hasn't been kind to my writing endeavors lately, but I finally generated enough content to post.
Read away! :)
Apparently the Originals didn't believe in the modern convenience of an alarm clock.
Of course not.
They seemed to prefer the old, but always effective, nudge-and-shake—a not-so-subtle demand that Caroline wake her ass up. Now. So much for southern hospitality, right?
She groaned from beneath the silky sheets.
"Leave me alone."
In response, someone tore open the balcony curtains. Bright yellow sunshine streamed across her face. The light, harsh and dazzling, stung like bees at her closed eyes.
Ordinarily, she'd be the type to bound out of bed shortly after the sun, determined not to waste the day with sleeping, already checking a dozen things off her to-do list before the clock struck 10. But not today. Not this morning.
Nope.
Tequila was the undeniable culprit here. It had painted 8 A.M. in a disagreeable light—you know, the kind that made her wish she was blind every time she attempted to open her eyes. Plus, until that obnoxious spinning subsided, Caroline infinitely preferred the darkness of sleep…and this bed…to the beautiful morning sunshine.
Caroline barricaded her head underneath a pillow at the foot of the bed in objection. (Apparently she'd slept upside down last night?)
"Aren't I entitled to some extra beauty sleep?" she complained, almost whining, "Please?"
When the room remained silent and no voice answered her, she snuggled further beneath the covers and sighed. It seemed that she had been offered a reprieve. Thank goodness.
Just at that precise moment, however, when she almost had surrendered to the inviting warmth of sleep again, Caroline heard something unexpected: music. A Faith Hill song, actually.
It blasted from speakers hidden somewhere in her room. Booming in such a thunderous cadence that she wanted to scratch her ears off. Or better yet, be deaf.
"—It's centrifugal motion. It's perpetual bli-iss. It's that pivotal mo-ment—"
The unanticipated loudness jolted a surprised Caroline from the bed to the floor with a thud. Tangled and twisted beneath blankets, she struggled to free herself and accost her awakener, which caused her to hop about like a blind bunny.
"—It's, ah, subliminal—"
Covered in blankets or not, Caroline didn't need her eyes to know which Mikaelson was behind such an ingenious, early morning prank. The song choice was proof enough of that. Not that she needed any reminders of last night…She remembered just fine, thank you very much!
"Is Elijah the only one of you who bothers to knock?" she grumbled.
"—This kiss, this KISS—" added in a whisper "—(it's criminal)—"
"Seriously, Kol, I get it—" she shouted over the lyrics. Covers flew over her shoulders, exposing her bed-head and mascara-bleeding raccoon eyes. "—You're funny…hilarious…hysterical…" she paused to swoosh matted blonde curls off her face and glare at him, "Now knock it off before I—"
The blankets crashed against her ankles. Caroline gasped when she saw the man leaning against one of the bed posts. "—kill you."
Arms crossed, Enzo grinned and said in his familiar accent, "You'd be killing the wrong rascal, Gorgeous."
With an exaggerated flick of his thumb, he paused the music.
"Steady yourself, precious, because your eyes are not deceiving you," he started, stepping into the middle of the room. "Enzo the Valiant has arrived!"
At this, he inclined his head and pressed his hand against his heart.
"At your service," he added with a wink.
Kol, laughing near the balcony doors, strode across the room to retrieve the musical device (probably an I-pod) that Enzo held.
"I told you she'd think it was me, mate," he said.
"Don't worry," Enzo replied, handing it over, "she'll adjust to having more than one joking man in her New Orleans life."
"Eventually…yes."
As he headed for the exit (still door-less), Kol clapped Enzo on the shoulder. "But until then, I'm going to make myself scarce." He cupped his hand and pretended to whisper. "My hangover and I prefer strong Colombian coffee before Caroline kills us."
"Oh, I'm going to kill you, all right," she warned his retreating figure, her foot tapping in measured annoyance.
Without turning around, Kol offered her a thumbs-up. His voice echoed as he passed into the hallway.
"I'll be in the kitchen, sunshine."
With Kol gone, Caroline could focus on Enzo exclusively. Her vampire-heightened-hangover demanded that she remain seated to do it, however. At least for now. Damn that lethal tequila.
She wrapped herself in a loose sheet and sat on the edge of the bed, patting the vacant space next to her.
"Did you drive all night?"
Enzo nodded and sat down.
"I left ten minutes after you hung up on me."
Caroline yawned.
"You must be exhausted."
"More pissed, really," he joked. He rubbed his hand across the dark stubble on his chin. "I'm not accustomed to blonde babes dodging my calls, after all."
"You made good time," she stated matter-of-factly, "but God only knows how many traffic laws you violated to get here so fast..."
Enzo waved in a "pfft" manner.
"My 3-cop snack made it easy, ironically. I faced no speed obstacles after that."
He snickered as Caroline, who was aghast and horrified at the thought, jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.
"But surely," he said, finally abandoning his jesting sarcasm, "you didn't think we'd leave you here friendless, did you?"
Enzo stole a side-glance at her as he said this. She shrugged uncomfortably, but remained silent, choosing to stare at her chipped nail polish instead.
He lifted her chin with his index finger.
"Listen here," he said, forcing her blue eyes to meet his brown ones, "I would never leave you here alone to deal with the Big Bad Wolf and the witchpocalypse. Understand?"
Caroline nodded and rubbed at her raccoon eyes.
"Good."
Here, he draped an arm around her neck and pulled her into him roughly, placing a kiss, sweet and chaste, on her right temple.
Meant as a reassuring gesture of sincere friendship, it touched Caroline's heart. Genuinely. She nestled into his shoulder and sighed.
"Thanks Boyfriend," she said.
"Besides," Enzo added, whispering into her hair, "Did you honestly think I'd dare to miss out on all the fun?"
This comment elicited contagious laughter to spread between them, displacing them in an amused moment shared only by them two. This is why, when a knock sounded on the door frame in the hallway, Caroline didn't notice the person who stepped into the room. That is, until he spoke her name.
"Ah, Caroline," Klaus drawled.
At the sound of his voice, she blushed (for no valid reason), then jerked out of Enzo's embrace and flashed to the dresser against the opposite wall, miserably attempting to tidy her disheveled appearance in the mirror. Not that it mattered—her hair was a blonde nest of knots.
"You're already awake," Klaus continued, un-phased, "Lovely."
Caroline groaned at her reflection; Enzo chuckled.
"I was reluctant to disturb you so early given last night's…" –he cleared his throat here, repressing a smirk—"…events, but it seems someone here has saved me the trouble."
Amusement evaporated from Klaus' face as he turned to look at Enzo. Klaus' posture became rigid as he appraised him with wide eyes.
"My pleasure, Klausy," Enzo replied, winking.
Standing with a clap, Enzo crossed the room and threw an arm around the stiff, scowling hybrid.
"I just thought it important that our girl be made aware of her Boyfriend's arrival."
Caroline bit her lip at this, cringing at the out-of-context connotation. Would Klaus understand that Enzo was just a friend?
"It's essential to have true, loyal friends in times like this. Wouldn't you agree—" Enzo asked with a pointed emphasis. He smacked Klaus hard on the back, "—mate?"
That was it. The last straw. Caroline watched as fury earthquaked across Klaus' nerves, shooting him across the spectrum from refined to savage. In a blink, his fingers gripped Enzo by the throat, dangling him like a deer head against the adjacent wall.
And here she thought the nickname "Klausy" would be more offensive than "mate."
"I see time has done little to correct your insolence, Lorenzo," Klaus snarled.
"The s—same—" Enzo gurgled, gasping for oxygen, "The same can be said about your—" he coughed "—bloody temper."
Sensing the tension—hell—the freaking danger, Caroline interfered the only way she knew how: by tackling Klaus to the ground.
(And no, he didn't see it coming.)
"Let's be adults, goddammit!" she yelled as their bodies collided.
Lying there on the floor, they became an entangled mass of limbs, fangs, sheets, and anger. She wrestled him to acquire the on-top position by sprawling her long legs across his torso and clutching him in a bear-hug around the neck. He could barely breathe, let alone move.
"Says the girl who just attacked me like I was a fucking rugby ball!" Klaus deadpanned, still flat on his back.
Observing this, Enzo laughed. Heartily.
Caroline hissed, pressing Klaus' chest deeper into the wood floor with her knees.
"Could you please refrain—" she asked, her fingers resting against his shoulder blades, "—from attempting to murder every single person who unexpectedly appears in this room?" She smacked him in the back of the head like a naughty schoolboy. "Especially friends who are here to help us?"
Enzo rubbed at his throat. Though the finger impressions had faded, they still were visible.
"Klausy doesn't bother me, Gorgeous." He waved his hand disinterestedly. "He's just sore about how we last parted…and you."
Caroline squinted back and forth between them.
"You two know each other?"
Klaus sighed; Enzo waggled an eyebrow. Exasperated, she threw her hands in the air.
"Of course you do!" she exclaimed, rolling off Klaus' back. "All you assholes know each other!"
What an omission from Enzo! Why must she be the last person to find out everything in New Orleans? Seriously. Though immature, she crossed her arms and embraced the full force of her pout.
"Enough!"
Releasing a growl, Klaus flashed them upright, his fingers clenched in the fabric at Caroline's waist. His lips trembled with a repressed something. Jealousy? Resentment? Longing? Would she ever know?
"We don't have time for this now," he said, rubbing a hand over his eyes and peering at Enzo. "We're expected at Rousseau's by 9."
"For what?" Caroline asked.
"Council meeting."
Caroline fixed him with a skeptical look. Klaus and diplomacy weren't exactly synonymous, after all…
"It's time the rest of New Orleans learned of this immortal witch problem," he said.
Stepping closer, he fixed her with a steady gaze. "And to do that…" he paused, searching her eyes, "I need you."
Caroline's heart quickened at the tender delivery of his last three words. Her throat dry, she couldn't speak.
Unfortunately, Enzo could.
"If you could just seal that last line with another steamy kiss—" he puckered his lips in mockery "—it would be pure perfection!"
Kol and his big mouth!
Blushing, Caroline shuffled out of Klaus' grasp to peer indignantly at Enzo who had propped himself on a footstool nearby.
"Say another word, Enzo, and I'll happily let Klaus tear out your tongue."
Thanks to a stinger left on the night stand that removed the remaining "sting" of her hangover—courtesy of a (considerate?) Klaus—Caroline showered and sobered in a matter of twenty minutes. Unfortunately, there was no such remedy for awkwardness. And awkward was precisely how Caroline felt.
It wasn't just because Klaus and Enzo flanked her on either side as they made their way to Rousseau's either, (that didn't help) but because she didn't know where she stood…with anyone. Stefan left a voicemail earlier saying her friends were relieved she was safe in New Orleans (more or less, anyway); but that they were busy chasing Kai leads. They'd check-in later.
As for Enzo, he'd lied! He'd known Klaus all along, but said nothing. Amid Damon's snarking about her and Klaus sitting-in-a-tree for the past year-and-a-half, too! Granted, it was a lie of omission…but it was a big one. In Caroline's mind, an omission that deliberate meant two things: 1) He was hiding something—something big, something bad. 2) He didn't trust her enough to tell her about it.
The latter stung her a bit. Hadn't she proven herself trustworthy? Had that friendship oath after her mother died meant nothing? Had the "eternal honesty" they'd vowed become a one-sided promise?
And then there was Klaus. Foremost in her thoughts…again. Caroline couldn't help but laugh at the irony of him—the eternal hybrid who refused to occupy anything less than an eternal place in the back of her mind.
Typical, she thought, shaking her head.
Though he sometimes waited in the periphery, Klaus remained in her thoughts. Always. The unsettling part? Not only was he a constant voice in her mind, but a persistent whisper in her heart. And that whisper, it became harder and harder to ignore with each passing day. The biggest problem, at least for Caroline, was this: the man was a freaking puzzle! His enigmatic behavior often generated more questions than answers. What did he want? How did he feel? Why did his kisses say one thing and his words another? The relentless inquiry was beyond infuriating. (Not to mention exhausting.)
She'd waited for him to breach the subject of their drunken kiss again, but with Enzo around, he seemed disinclined. The closest he ventured occurred while they waited for their order at a bakery across from Rousseau's.
The meeting didn't start for another twenty minutes and Caroline wanted breakfast. Besides, nothing smelled quite as delicious in the morning as fresh yeast. Dragging the protesting hybrid by the hand, therefore, she approached the counter and placed her order.
"150 chocolate-covered croissants, please."
"Bloody hell, Caroline," Klaus complained, "you can't possibly be that hungry."
She rolled her eyes at his reaction.
"They're for the Council members, genius."
He laughed.
"That's absurd!"
"No—" Caroline fixed him with a look "—it's nice." She strummed her fingers on the countertop. "I know you're not entirely unfamiliar with the concept."
Diverted, his lips twitched.
"I don't get much practice, I'm afraid."
They waited for ten minutes. Klaus proposed that they incite some kind of hurry-the-hell-up incentive, but Caroline blocked his path to the staff. (Luckily for them.) Propped on a red deco stool, she hummed along with the radio until their number was called.
"In case I forgot to mention it," he said as they left, four overflowing bags-in-hand, "you have a lovely singing voice."
That was it. Klaus alluded to nothing else that occurred last night. Not the you mean nothing speech on the balcony, not the Cami-Enzo factors, not the tequila-fueled lip-lock. Nothing. If what he'd said was true, then why did he kiss her back?
Caroline didn't know what to think. And feeling clueless about a man…that freaking sucked.
Additional Note:
Another fluffy chapter, I know. I'd originally intended for this chapter to (re)-introduce the antagonists, Kai and Freya, but I'm saving that for chapter 6. It works better for the story's progression. And since I already have it partly written, I absolutely promise that they'll appear next chapter. *crosses heart in writer's honor*
Also, Carenzo and Koroline are both brOTPs of mine, so you'll definitely see some interplay between them in this fic. Thoughts? Reviews would be lovely!
Thanks for reading.