A/N: Thank you so much for the reviews. :) Just another reminder: I'm not taking drabble requests currently, and if I was, I would only be taking them on tumblr. Sorry. :(
Abridged summaries:
1. Part II to "In This Business" (first drabble in Chapter 40)
2. Klaus owns a tattoo shop and has a bit of a crush on Caroline, the owner of the flower shop next door.
3. Caroline and Klaus talk about the significance of Silas appearing to them as the other.
Enjoy!
-Angie

Sequel to "In This Business" (Chapter 40). Takes place a few months after that drabble ends. Happy ending.

"Never again," she mumbled as she felt his lips trace her shoulder, his hand reaching around to cup her breast.

"You say that every time, but you never mean it."

She sighed, trying to move to press her back against his front without making it obvious that she was seeking his body heat. If he noticed he didn't comment, which she was thankful for, though he did wrap an arm around her. "I know."

"So you admit that you never mean it?"

"I don't know," she said, letting her eyelids close. "It scares me. We kill people for a living, Klaus. We're bad people. We don't deserve happy endings."

"So you say."

"It's true."

"Is that really what's stopping you? Some misplaced sense of guilt?"

"I don't know, okay? It's just...it makes no sense. You were this ghost that no one knew. Your name scared the bejeezus out of everyone, and then suddenly you turn up randomly at my assignment and shoot the guy before I say anything and then just...walk away."

"And as I recall I received a very thorough talking to about how that was your kill and could I please find someone else's job to ruin because you were in no mood to outsource."

"And I punched you in the nose."
"I let you punch me in the nose."

"Doesn't change the fact that it happened. And anyway, I still don't understand what your deal is. Like, you just randomly walked up and shot him and tried to leave. You didn't even take the money, You let me have it. Why?"

"How come you didn't ask me these things months ago?"

"Because months ago I thought that you would be a one night stand."

"I think we're passed one-nighters, love."

"Yes, now. Back then, though, I was just confused. I still don't get it."

"I fancy you."

"You didn't even know me."

"You're right. I didn't. I admit that the first time I just wanted to fuck you and be done with it, but you intrigued me."

"Oh, good to know that I was intriguing enough for you not to throw aside like trash."

"Hey, don't be like that, love."

She huffed and didn't answer.

"Caroline, I enjoy you very much."

"Yeah, I enjoy you too, that's the problem."

She could practically feel his long-suffering eyeroll in her bones. "I know that you think that there's no room for attachment here, but I'm already attached, and as much as you hate to admit it, I know you are too."

"Yeah, but just because I like you doesn't mean I should."

"Why shouldn't you?"

"Because we are contracted to kill people. It's dangerous. Every time you leave I don't know if I'm going to see you again."

"And if I died would it hurt any less than if we were involved?"

"If being involved wouldn't change anything, why bother doing it?" she countered. "We don't need a label for this. We can't have a label for it."

"I don't need a label, Caroline. I just need to know that you reciprocate this attachment."

"I just told you that I did."

"So then what's the problem, love? Why are you making this so complicated?"

"I told you, Klaus. The problem is that this...what we do is dangerous. If we were together, we'd have plans and share space and see each other on a consistent basis. We barely have a way to communicate. I don't think I've had anything but a prepaid phone in years, and I only access my email once a week, if that."

"You're overthinking this."

"I overthink everything, and if that bothers you, then this is not going to work."

"So there's a 'this' now?" he asked, smirking against her shoulder.

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

He sighed. "I'm sure we'll figure it out. We both have safehouses and contacts across the country, as well as some on foreign soil."

"So what am I supposed to do, leave sticky notes in the key dish saying where I'm headed next? 'Dear Klaus, I'm on my way to murder five people in Boise but I'll be home for dinner, xoxo Caroline'?"

"No, of course not. Knowing you, you'd make each safehouse correspond with a color, make me memorize all of them, and then leave a blank notepad in the key dish."

"That's not funny."

But totally accurate, she inwardly acknowledged, already mentally matching safehouses to colors.

"And you're already color-coding them in your head."

"Oh, shut up."

"Judging by the annoyance coloring your tone, I assume that I'm right?"

She snuggled closer to him and chose not to acknowledge his terrible pun, moving her bare feet to rest against his legs. "Your feet are freezing."

"Hmm. Too bad. If we were a thing you'd be dealing with it all the time. Think you can handle it?"

"I'll handle you."

She huffed and pressed her feet even closer, more to annoy him than because he was warm. "You're not funny."

He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her completely against him, his warmth encompassing her as he kissed her jaw lightly.

"Plus, if we were a thing, I'd love to go around telling everyone how the 'Original Killer' is a cuddler," she said, referencing the nickname he'd been given by the others.

Everyone was terrified of him, and she was too, though for completely different reasons. "Only for you," he mumbled.

"See? You can't say things like that, Klaus. You're trying to become a fluffy bunny, and I know you're not, and I don't want you to be."

"I'm not a fluffy bunny," he said, clearly insulted. "And I'm glad you don't want me to change, because I won't. I will still shoot my targets with no remorse, and I will still want to push you against the nearest wall and make you come around my cock every time I see you do the same."

"That's not healthy."

"There is nothing about this relationship that is healthy."

"We aren't in a relationship, Klaus."

He disentangled himself from her, moving off the bed and grabbing his jeans from the floor. "What are you doing?" she asked, sitting up, not bothering to cover her bare breasts with the sheet.

"I'm done trying to reason with you. You've given me your answer a million times over, and you clearly won't change your mind. I'm not going to fight a battle I've clearly lost."

"There's no winning in this, Klaus!"

"You're right, there's not. It's just both of us losing because you're too fucking stubborn to realize how hopelessly in love with you I am."

"No, I know that you're in love with me. That's not the problem."

"Then what is the problem? What are you so afraid of?"

"I already told you! The problem is that this stuff we do is dangerous. Someday you're not going to come back. Or maybe I won't. Maybe you're going to sit and wait for me and I'll never walk through that door," she said, getting out of the bed herself, walking over to him.

"You're right," he said, pausing to pull his shirt over his head before speaking again. "You're right. Maybe one of us will get killed, but do you really want that regret in your life, Caroline? If I die, are you going to regret not trying? Because I know that I will."

"Of course I will, but I'm not going to give up my job, and I know you won't either, and this just shouts 'disaster waiting to happen' to me."

"I'm not going to try to convince you, Caroline. You've made up your mind. If you ever change it, you can track me down, but I'm done being strung along by you."

"And how will I know that I'll track you down and you won't want me anymore?"

He gave her a grim smile, bending down to lace up his boots. "You don't. But right now I can't imagine not wanting you. That's why I have to leave."

She felt torn. She wanted him to stay, needed it, even. But she just couldn't get the word out, so she let him go.

He didn't look back.

XXX

It was Katherine who told her.

Caroline felt like her legs wouldn't support her body, and she felt her breathing speed up unnaturally, her chest clenching. She hadn't seen Klaus in almost a year, but as much as she wanted them to, her feelings for him hadn't died.

"What do you mean he's gone?"

"He's not dead. At least, not as far as we know. Just disappeared on an assignment. We told him it could be a trap, but he didn't seem to care much, and—"

"And you let him go? On a clear suicide mission? What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"What do you care? He's your competi—"

"When did this happen?" Caroline asked urgently.

"Umm...A few days ago?"

"What was the mission?"

"Care, I don't—"
"What was the mission? You are going to tell me now, Katherine, or I swear to god I will rip out your inner organs while prolonging your life as long as possible so that you can feel every single painful second."

"He was supposed to kill the head of the Vervain Guild, but we knew it was a possibility that they just wanted to capture—"

"You will give me the location now."

Katherine rattled off an address for the known base and Caroline wrote it down and memorized it. Luckily, it was only a few miles away from her current residence, and she blessed every single deity that she could think of as she gathered all of the weapons she could comfortably carry and set off.

She managed to sneak in (when would villains stop installing air canals in their bases? It just seemed like complete idiocy at this point) and beat up a guard, taking their uniform. These people were completely useless and had apparently never seen any spy movies ever. Everyone knew that fiction always had a grain of truth somewhere…

She slit the guard's throat and hid her in a closet under a fire blanket, making sure the body wasn't visible, and set off.

She found him quickly, simply following the direction in which the number of guards seemed to grow, and managed to convince them that they were on lunch break before waiting for them to be out of sight and walking in.

Klaus was pale and covered in cuts, but seemed otherwise fine. He looked at her, surprised, before his eyes narrowed. "Why?"

"Why what?" she asked, confused by his reaction.

"Are you one of them?"

"Are you fucking kidding me? I'm here to save you, you fuckwad."

She walked behind him and cut through the ropes around his hands, pulling an energy bar out of her bra and handing it to him, making him raise his eyebrows, though he unwrapped it and took a bite when he realized that she wasn't going to stop glaring at him until he did it.

"Let's go," she said, grabbing his hand and trying to pull him up.

"I can't."

She froze before dropping his hand. "What do you mean, you can't?"

"I'm not strong enough to get out, and I'll only slow you down. I don't want you to end up—"

"I will get you out of here if I have to kill everyone in this goddamned base to do it, and you will move your ass right now, because we don't have time to argue about it."

"But what if you—"

"I promise that in the event that we are clearly going to be recaptured, I'll run. Will that make you feel better?" she asked, lying to his face.

He clearly knew that she was lying, too, but got up shakily, taking her hand and stuffing the rest of the energy bar in his mouth. She pulled him towards the door, trying to go slow, giving him the guard's handgun and taking out her own from under her shirt, where it was strapped to a harness.

"How many things do you store in there?" he asked, looking slightly impressed.

"You'd be surprised. It's practically a second purse. Inc: two right."

He whirled around in a practiced motion, shooting both incoming guards in the chest as she took out the one coming in on her left.

Knowing that their cover was blown, Caroline ripped off the guard's heavy pants, leaving her in her normal stretchy jeans—much easier to run in—but not bothering with the guard's shirt. They moved quickly and quietly with practiced light steps. "Do you know where an exit is?"

"I believe they came in a few halls away. They weren't as competent with blindfolding as they believed."

She resisted the urge to laugh, pulling him in the direction he indicated, and shooting another guard before slamming the door open, the harsh sunlight making Klaus squint. "Do you have a vehicle?"

She shook her head, scanning for anything they could use before spying an all-terrain truck about twenty yards away. They ran, and she shot the handle, pulling the door open, and motioning for Klaus to climb over the driver's seat to the passenger's side, turning around to watch their backs. "Can you hotwire?"

"Too modern. It'd take a lot of time."

There were guards coming out of the building, and she managed to shoot two of the eight while she heard Klaus swear colorfully as he tried to find some way to start the car.

"This one's not going to work, love. How did you get here?"

"I parked a few miles away. I'm not sure which direction," she said a bit breathlessly, shooting another guard, and starting to panic at the sound of clicking. Her gun was out of bullets.

He had apparently heard because he gave her his. "If there's a motorcycle that would be easier."

"Look around, I guess?" she half-asked, shooting another guard.

"How am I supposed to look around when I can't move?"

"Figure it out," she snapped.

He huffed and there was some rustling behind her as the glove compartment opened and he muttered an 'excellent' under his breath before saying, "They have binoculars."

She restrained a sarcastic comment and concentrated on the last two guards, who had found cover, while she had absolutely none.

"There's one that way. Looks older, too, so it might be easier."

"Cover on the way?"

"None."

"Think you can run?"

"I can try."

"Okay. Tell me when you're out the other side."

After he said he was ready, they ran, Caroline stopping once or twice to shoot at the guards, neither of whom dropped, and she heard Klaus swear under his breath again before she was pulled unceremoniously onto the motorcycle without warning, making her shriek in surprise, and she heard the revving of the engine before they were moving alarmingly fast. She grabbed the back of his shirt with one hand, attaching the gun to her belt.

They knew they had very little time until one of the cars followed them, and so they just drove until they found a town before dumping the motorcycle on the side of the road. Klaus looked like he'd been in a knife fight (which to be fair, he had, though it was decidedly one-sided), and Caroline hurriedly unbuttoned her guard's shirt, leaving her in a tank top, and gave it to him to replace his tattered t-shirt, not bothering to avert her eyes, making him grin as he pulled it on.

"I have a safehouse about ten miles from here. Do you think you can make it a mile or two to the next town? It's bigger and might have a bus or rental car place or something."

He nodded, though she doubted he was being truthful, and they stopped at a nearby drugstore to buy a few bottles of water. The cashier looked at them suspiciously, especially when he saw the gun-shaped bulge under Klaus's shirt, but a little bit of cleavage and hair twirling fixed that little problem, and they were off.

They managed to hitch a ride to the next town from two teenage boys who eyed Caroline hungrily once Klaus flashed three twenties at them from her wallet. They arrived at the town in ten minutes, and Klaus asked if they'd be willing to drive just a bit further for an extra twenty, and that got them another few miles to the town a mile or two away from the tiny suburb where Caroline had her safehouse (and car).

They walked for what felt like hours in silence, and if Klaus noticed that she was still gripping his hand like a lifeline despite the fact that he seemed perfectly capable of walking, he didn't say anything.

She practically dragged him to her bedroom once they'd arrived, but he insisted that he needed a shower, and she acquiesced, changing into clean clothes and getting one of the larger t-shirts and a pair of jeans she kept in her closet that just happened to be his size.

For completely un-Klaus-related reasons, of course.

She tried not to look at him when he came back, unable to quell the embarrassment that she didn't know why she felt, and she heard him dress.

"Caroline?"

She turned around to see him pulling on his shirt, and she gave him a small smile. "What?"

"Thank you," he said, his voice serious.

She nodded, pulling her knees to her chest, her toes curling into the comforter.

"Would you like to give me a ride to the airport?"

"You're not staying?" she asked, confused.

"Why would I?" he asked slowly, his eyes guarded.

She bit her lip. "Because I want you to."

"Are you sure?" he asked, and she knew that he was giving her an out, a chance for her to take back the words that were so loaded to both of them.

"Yes. Stay."

whenever you're not too busy may i please request a drabble where klaroline are in the gritty side of town, caroline owns a flower shop that's right next to klaus' tattoo shop? i remember reading this off of melissa's tags and man you can just come up with soooo many different fanfictions when you go through her tags! thanks so much :)

She was, quite literally, the girl next door.

Or, at least, the girl that owned the flower shop next door to his small tattoo business.

Wholesome and unobtainable, with an impish smile and a patterned sundress, even in the middle of winter.

He wasn't obsessed with her. Really, he wasn't.

She always smiled at him too, and he would give her a dimpled smile back. He'd talked to her once when he bought flowers for his mother's funeral (and good lord could he not wait for his father to get his shit together and die, too). She gave her condolences, but was very business-like, and he liked that.

He'd made up his mind a month into them cohabitating the block that he'd ask her for coffee. He had a mirror, he knew he was attractive, and he'd never been anything but nice to her in the time they'd known each other, and when he asked her, she gave him a soft smile and turned him down gently.

"I have a boyfriend."

He'd never seen said boyfriend, and had decided that he didn't exist and she was making up excuses (and fine then, if she didn't want to date him he wasn't going to pressure her). So he started seeing another woman, who was reasonably nice and a good fuck, but not Caroline enough.

That was her name: Caroline.

The girl in the flower shop. Not the girlfriend. He still mumbled Camille's name during sex to make sure he wouldn't say Caroline by accident (he nearly slipped once, but she was screaming his name too loudly to notice).

Oops.

And then, of course, the whole thing went to hell in a handbasket when Camille was supposed to meet him at his tattoo shop around noon so that he could take her to lunch, and she was late. He locked up and was just about text her when he saw her a few yards away admiring a bouquet in Caroline's shop window.

"Cami," he said, awkwardly turning his head at the last second so that her lips landed on his cheek instead of his lips. "You were supposed to come for lunch."

"Yeah, I know. Sorry. I got distracted by the flowers."

"Would you like to take a look?" Caroline asked stiffly, and his eyes flew up to see her face, noting that her smile was the least genuine one he'd ever seen her wear.

"No, that's all right."

He saw Camille pout out of the corner of his eye and pushed back a sigh, pulling out his wallet. Caroline had most definitely seen him dodge the kiss and would think him even more of a prick if he was rude to his girlfriend, and if he and Camille ever broke up and he actually ended up having a chance, she'd remember it. "On second thought, yes. The peonies all right, love?" he asked Camille absently, giving Caroline the money for them.

"Yeah. Those'll look great with the new paintings in the living room."

"I haven't seen your living room since you re-decorated," he said, trying to hint as subtly as possible that they weren't living together.

"True," Camille said, accepting the flowers from Caroline with a smile, grabbing his hand and practically dragging him away.

He broke up with her two days later, feeling guilty for leading her on, and she cried, but not much, simply nodding and asking him to leave her alone.

"How'd your girlfriend like the flowers?" Caroline asked pleasantly as he walked by her shop the day afterwards.

"We broke up, actually."

A flash of sympathy moved through her face. "I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "It's all right. It just wasn't working. How's your boyfriend?"

"What boyfriend?" she asked, frowning.

"The one you cited when turning me down for coffee last year," he said slowly.

"Oh. Tyler and I broke up months ago."

"I'm sorry," he said uncomfortably.

"It's all right. It just wasn't working," she said, parroting his words back to him with a small smile. "I think that person's waiting for you, though."

"What?" he asked, checking over his shoulder.

Sure enough, his ten o'clock was waiting for him in front of the door. He swore under his breath, trying to ignore the way she clearly was fighting down a laugh, and excused himself.

When he came out later for lunch, he saw her ringing up a customer through the window, and she waved at him after the customer had left. "Hello."

"Hey, Klaus."

"Would you like to go for coffee with me?"

"Rather quick move-on, isn't it?" she said casually, though he knew by the stiffness of her shoulders that she was a bit defensive.

"Not if I never moved on from you."

She snorted derisively, crossing her arms over her chest. "Nice try."

"I asked you out when I first met you."

"You did," she agreed. "You still don't know me."

"But I want to know you. Isn't that enough?"

"Fine. But the first thing you need to know about me is that I hate coffee."

"Duly noted."

Could you please do a drabble where Caroline and Klaus discuss the significance of Silas appearing to each of them as the other?

"I have a question."

"What's that, love?" Klaus asked, his voice tired.

He was used to this by now. She always seemed to save her most personal and emotion-evoking questions until three in the morning after sex. He suspected it was because it was easier for her to ask in the dark. They both knew that it didn't matter, that his night vision was excellent and he could see the vulnerability in her eyes, but they always just ignored it.

Caroline turned over in bed to look at him, and he rested a hand on her hip, his thumb rubbing her skin lightly through the fabric of her cotton sleep shorts.

"Why did Silas appear to you as me?"

"I'm not quite sure what you're asking, love."

"You were injured. Or, well, you thought you were. You thought you were dying, right?"

"Yes," he said, his voice short.

He didn't want to talk about this, didn't want to show how uncomfortable the conversation made him. He knew exactly why Silas appeared as Caroline, and it was because it was Caroline he'd wanted to see.

"So why me? Why not your sister or something?"

"Because I didn't want to see anyone else. My sister and brothers are very aware of my feelings towards them, and I of theirs towards me. You were...a different situation."

"How?"

"I think you know the answer to that."

Caroline frowned, apparently genuinely confused. "No. I don't. What do you mean?"

"I thought I was dying," he repeated, not quite sure what she didn't understand.

"I know that, and after he left you called me. I just don't understan—"

"Because I wanted to see you one last time. I have spent hundreds of years with all of my siblings, with the exception of Finn. I know their faces. But you…" he took a shaky breath before he continued. "You, I would never understand. I didn't know how you felt, or whether you reciprocated my feelings. I needed to see you, to remember your face, to hear your voice. I wouldn't have been able to tell you, back then. I still wasn't quite sure how to handle it. Even now, I sometimes don't...But, in any case, I needed you to know that you were important to me."

"You had barely known me for a few months, how—"

"I don't know if you know this, but untriggered werewolves have, shall we say, 'anger issues'. They have a lot of trouble connecting with people and restraining their aggression. When I triggered my gene, that melted away, similarly to Tyler. I have gathered that he wasn't the most pleasant person before his transition."

"What does that have to do with me?"

"My anger and hate towards others no longer overwhelmed me as much as it did before. I had room to care, I suppose. And you were intriguing to me."

"Oh," she said softly.

"I would have thought you knew. You were the one to first put a label on it, after all."

She shifted slightly, tangling her legs with his. "I guess."

"Why are you asking, love?"

She sighed. "I guess I was thinking about how you appeared to me, and—"

"What?"

He hadn't known that Silas had appeared to her as him.

It was simultaneously thrilling and terrifying to know that back then he was the one she wanted to see, that she'd cared so intensely for him even before that day in the woods.

"Did I not tell you about that?" she asked, seeming genuinely surprised.

"No."

"Oh...Well, it was after you left for New Orleans the first time, when Elena had her humanity off, and you know how people are...They say the thing that will hurt you the most. So she implied that I secretly wanted you—"

"Which you did," he pointed out, a small smirk curling over his face.

"Which I did," she agreed. "But it still hurt to hear it, you know? I felt like I was betraying everyone just because I felt something for you, and it hurt to hear Elena say it out loud. Anyway, Silas came to me later in your form, and he told me things that I wanted to hear…"

"For instance?"

He could see her bite her lip, unsure, and he gently pulled her to him. "You don't have to tell me if—"

"He said that you hadn't had any intention of leaving, of moving on. That you couldn't stop thinking about me. He asked me to come to New Orleans, and honestly I hadn't been so tempted, even when you asked me at graduation. I felt like everything was falling apart so much, and I was so done, you know?"

He didn't, but nodded anyway, wanting her to continue.

"He asked me what I was afraid of, and I said you, because I was. I was so afraid of what I felt, and he said that too…"

She trailed off, and he mentally cursed Silas in every language he could think of. He was about to ask her what happened, but she laughed quietly. "I was miserable, you know, after we had sex in the woods. Not because you left. I mean, not directly. I just didn't realize how you were the only one who really got me, you know? Once you were gone after graduation, I just felt stifled...I think you were the only one that believed that I could decide things for myself."

His brain was still catching up to what was going on in the present, still reeling from her experience with Silas, and the only thing he could think of before she was continuing her little speech was how ridiculous it was that her friends thought she couldn't decide things.

"I wanted you to come back," she added, seemingly a bit self-conscious.

"I would have come back for you. If you'd asked."

"I know, but I didn't want to ask. I wanted to be able to do everything myself, and I could, and that felt amazing. I felt like I could take on anything…"

He smiled, and she gave him a small smile back. "I know that you're a bajillion times my age—"

"Forty. I'm forty times your age," he said, a bit amused.

She made a face. "That makes it sound a lot worse."

"I suppose."

"Anyway, though...I thought that you'd think I was immature and get tired of me, but you make me feel good about myself. Actually, I guess you really helped me see that I don't need anyone else's approval to be able to feel good about myself, you know?"

She moved closer to him, pressing herself against him and burying her face in his neck. She liked cuddling, and he liked making her happy (and wasn't going to say no to having her legs tangled up in his and her scent draped over him). His hand moved from her hip to her lower back as he wrapped it around her, and she gave a little sigh of contentment.

"Just so you know, Silas was quite right. I couldn't stop thinking about you, and if you had asked I would have been at the airport before you finished your sentence."

She laughed, her breath hot against his skin. "I know."

A/N: Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed them, and please tell me what you thought. :)
Hugs!
-Angie