January, 1911

Kol hadn't been by for four days.

Normally this would only be a minor issue. Something that would annoy her, but not cause a fight or anything. But the last few times she had been able to see him had been different. He'd been distant. Detached.

A traitorous thought had entered her mind recently, but now it seemed to never leave her head.

Am I not enough?

Realistically she knew that they were good together for the most part. And she knew that he didn't open himself up to people other then her. Ever. From the emotional standpoint they were doing great. He knew her better than anyone else ever had, and she suspected that it was similar in his case as well. They loved each other.

But she was worried about the physical part. Because there really wasn't a physical part. They kissed constantly, but she hadn't been comfortable with letting him get much farther than feeling her chest. Both of them had stripped off their shirts and he had once used his mouth on her chest in a way that made her head spin, but any farther than that was usually when she froze up.

Her parents had always raised her to be the perfect lady. When she was alive her mother had always insisted that she act properly, perfecting her manners and etiquette. They'd groomed her so that she would marry into the high society and play her part as a human doll. Now with her father's drunkenness and subsequent estrangement he didn't have any say in how she lived her life, but one thing they had told her since she was young had stuck:

Do not lay with a man before marriage, or you'll be ruined in the eyes of men and God.

She wanted to make Kol happy, and she thought that being with him that way might even make her happy, but that often repeated line would play in her mind and immediately put an end to whatever feelings she'd been experiencing. She didn't even know if she believed in God, and questioned why he would care about a single random French-Irish girl's virginity if he did exist, but she couldn't stop the bouts of nerves.

He was used to sex. He'd had it often enough before they'd begun going steady, and now she feared that he continued to regularly have sex - just not with her. She could see it in his eyes every time he told her that he loved her that he meant it. But you didn't have to love someone to have sex with them.

The last time he'd come to see her, she was pretty sure she could the remnants of red lipstick on the corner of his mouth. She hadn't kissed him that night.

February, 1911

"I have to tell you something."

Those words made Bea completely freeze. So this was the night he was breaking things off. Alright. She'd been preparing for this for a while. And the moment she'd let him in the door tonight she had known something was different. He was nervous. Of course it wasn't obvious, but the quick way his dark eyes scanned the room gave it away.

"I don't really know how to begin –"

Cutting him off, she said quietly but firmly, "When did it start?"

He looked a little confused and suddenly sidetracked from what was clearly a rehearsed speech.

"When did what start?"

Now annoyed and already stressed on top of that, Bea narrowed her eyes and said in a derisive tone, "When did you start seeing other women?"

His eyes widened almost comically and he looked incredulous, but she wasn't going to let him break off their relationship without admitting to his trysts first. She deserved the truth.

"What the hell are you talking about? I haven't been seeing any other bloody women? Are you daft?"

"Don't play at being dumb, Kol. We hardly see one another anymore, and on the rare occasion you do come by you seem to look at me like we're étrangers. Obviously we haven't gone all the way, but if you were unhappy with our relationship-"

He snorted in response to that, which made her see red, but before she could start shrieking at him he shook his head and let out an exasperated sigh. It did not calm her down in any way whatsoever.

"You've got it all wrong. I've been trying to think of a way to tell you something. I'm not off having sex with other women."

"Oh really. So you have something so important to tell me that you've been avoiding me for weeks, coming here at strange hours, and smelling like other women's perfume?"

"Well… yes."

"Then do dépêchez-vous and get the fucking message across, because I truly, honestly am at the end of my rope, Kol."

Two hours and two thirds a handle of vodka later she had her answer.

"So, vampires."

"Yes."

"They are just… something. That's out there. And you're one thousand years old."

"You've got it."

"Huh."

They sat in silence at her kitchen table, a mocking imitation of all of the other nights they had spent doing the very same thing. She reached toward the bottle in the center of the table and poured the last of it into her glass, throwing it back with a grimace.

"Well my brother in law is a warlock. Magic exists. I probably should have looked into whether or not there was anything else out there."

Kol shrugged and said in a falsely light tone, "Not sure if he knows. He was taught magical parlor tricks by family, not a proper coven. Hasn't figured out what I am and sells me artifacts for a tenth of what they're worth."

Like an absentminded reflex, she flicked his forearm and said, "Ass."

He quirked his lips into an amused smile.

"You understand you just flicked the most powerful being in the world, correct?"

Bea just shook her head dismissively and waved in his direction.

"No jokes. Not yet. Still processing."

He let her sit in silence as she thought over all that he had told her. He was one thousand years old. The story was too intricate for it to be made up. He and his family were turned into monsters by their very own mère. Kol had killed people. It was something she had considered him having done what with the remarks he sometimes made. But for that number to be in the thousands? The hundred-thousands?

Of course her first relationship was with a vampire.

For some reason she blurted out the first real thought she could grasp onto in a rush of air, "Have you heard me when I mutter under my breath the entire time we've known one another?"

He nodded but didn't speak, continuing to let her come to terms with the news at her own pace. It was after deliberating for another minute or two that she finally met his eyes and said in a calm voice, "We're going to have to work on honesty in this relationship, Monsieur Mikaelson."

He visibly stiffened and then forced himself to relax. His expression was the strangest cross between hopeful and scared.

"You still want to be with me?"

She nodded slowly, thinking it over herself before replying, "Yes. I do. If you stop avoiding me and treating me like a leper."

He laughed incredulously, clearly disbelieving, and said in a patronizing tone, "You understand I'm a murderer? I don't just kill to eat, I love it. I crave the chaos and destruction. I see humans – most, anyway- as beneath me. And you aren't running. Are you actually mental?"

Bea had to steel herself. She knew what he was doing. He always tested her in a roundabout way, pushing to see how far he could go until she snapped. He'd expected her to revile him, so now he was trying to make that happen.

"You've never asked me to change. I know that I swear like a ruffian and sometimes go off in another language. I'm too brash for a woman. Too loud, sarcastic, mean – I'm too much for most people. You accept me and love me anyway. So I'm going to try to do the same for you."

The movement in the room that followed her statement was so sudden. So fast that her inebriated mind literally couldn't process what had happened for a moment as her stomach lurched. But then it hit her.

Kol had picked her up and moved her, and was now pinning her to the kitchen wall with his body, his hand loosely wrapped around her throat.

"Don't you GET IT? I smell you, and you are a meal to me. I want to tear into your flesh and drain you dry. I could flick my wrist and wrench your head from your neck."

His voice had wavered, and the fingers gently held against her throat were shaking. Kol was nervous, maybe even scared. He was expecting that she'd leave. That is exactly what she knew she should do.

She was scared. So, so terrified. But this was Kol. So she slowly lifted her own hand and laid it over his.

"Would you, though?"

He didn't answer her. Instead he pulled his hand away from her neck and propped it just next to her head. Only inches away, she could see every emotion pass across his face. Finally he settled on looking plain exhausted. He leaned forward and when his lips ghosted along her neck she couldn't stop her shiver of fear.

However, he simply pressed his lips firmly where her pulse had to be racing once before tilting his face back to press his forehead against hers. His eyes were closed and his voice was only just more than a whisper when he replied, "No. I don't know why you're different. But I swear I will never hurt you. I'd kill anyone who tried."

Bea surged forward, sealing her mouth over his. She could almost imagine the taste of blood in his mouth, salt and rust, but she shoved her tongue between his lips anyway. Kol was here, he wasn't breaking things off with her, and he still loved her.

Right in this moment, it was enough.