Note: This is a oneshot collection composed of separate, unrelated fics unified by the common theme of Caroline being an escort whose patron falls in love with her. This first fic is Klaroline. The other storylines that I already have laid out are for Carenzo and Jack Bass x Caroline, so oneshots for those pairings can be expected in the future.

I. KLAROLINE

You got a fast car
I want a ticket to anywhere
Maybe we can make a deal
Maybe together we can get somewhere

He cuts a striking figure as he walks across the bar's polished teakwood floor. A tall young man, no more than thirty one, with steely eyes of pewter blue and a stern-set jaw bristled by day-old stubble barely darker than the colour of his ashen blond hair. His sinewy frame is evinced by a tailored herringbone suit, silver-gray tie august against the crisp white of his dress shirt; there's a six-year old Calatrava (5153G – a gift from his mother) glinting from the sleeve of his left wrist, but the average observer would have taken more note of the thin brown box he holds inflexibly in his hand.

He takes his usual seat in the middle-right side of the stately-furnished room, and he only has to nod once at the brunette bar tender behind him before he's served with a glass of scotch and water a mere few seconds later. Four parts scotch, three parts water – Katherine Pierce knows his choice of drink all too well. There are many things to be said about Niklaus Mikaelson, but foremost is the fact that he has been to this bar every single Tuesday night for the past seven months.

Each evening comes to pass the way it always does. He'd sit on his table, send for a drink, and silently listen to tuneful notes of Chopin and Gershwin and Debussy and Jarrett, all rendered adroitly on keys of white and black ivory by the bar's lone pianist. Sometimes he'd be joined by a friend - the one with piercing brown eyes and the same lilting English brogue - but on most nights he'd simply sit there by himself, sipping on scotch which in the bartender's opinion is far too bitter for merely slaking the need to pass time.

And then she'd arrive.

She'd enter from the side door and walk quietly up the platform, grace reminiscent of a Sindarin minstrel come to play for Rivendell's lord. Never in the short, tight bandage numbers most lounge singers her age prefer, she'd wear something much more lithe and feminine, like the pleated chiffon dress she has on tonight. Her blonde hair would be tumbling loosely down her shoulders, fair face lit up by sea green eyes.

If there was beauty in simplicity, it came in the name of Caroline Forbes.

She'd acknowledge the pianist with a small, meek smile before taking her place on the stage, the older musician smiling back as he allows her a moment to level the standing microphone with her Imaginaire-glossed lips. A gilded melody would soon tinkle into the room, soft notes woven with words dulcet as alyssums in summer. The Tuesday before, she ended with Bacharach's What the World Needs Now; tonight, she begins with Sinatra's Fly Me to the Moon.

He would spend the next hour listening to her sing. He'd rarely utter a word, even when his friend is present, soldered gaze never wandering away from her for longer than a few seconds. Every night she'd afford him the same brief glance the rest of her audience would receive - kind and earnest though fleeting - but each time their eyes meet, an inexplicable tensity would tinge the air. It is as though a stroke is effaced from a painting, a string broken from a violin, a line undone from a sonnet; it's almost amusing, really, how something seemingly so beautiful can feel heavy and empty all at the same time.

The musical euphony would fade into a curt but warm "Thank you" at the end of the hour, and after the reply of a grateful smile at those who care to pause from their affairs and accord her soft applause, she'd disappear into the side door once again. Another singer would arrive to take the seat she vacated, claiming the vocal baton as a melody starts anew, and the pleasant evening which the customers came to the bar for would continue.

He'd stay in his table for a handful more minutes, swirling his scotch in a listless, half-hearted effort that would have made him appear distracted if it were not for the grim resolve one could so easily read from his eyes. His friend would send him a knowing glance, throw in a word or two; he'd reply with an answer always spoken too mutedly to hear. And after a measure of time that only he can decide is enough, he'd rise and walk towards the bar's east-side exit to leave.

Or so the average observer is led to think.

-o-

He strides wordlessly past the elevator lobby, furtively slipping to a corner down the hall. An entryway to a private lift greets him, and he wastes not a moment longer, inserting a black, nondescript key card on the slot above the arrow panel. A faint click is heard, and the elevator doors open without a sound. He steps in, index finger swiftly pressing the biometrically-activated fifth floor button alight.

Legato is a cocktail bar unlike most establishments it shares its trade with in brisk Manhattan. Neither on the sprightly stretch of lively bars and restaurants jazzing up the Meatpacking District nor on the penthouse of a trendy boutique hotel in SoHo or Tribeca, it sits, instead, on the first two floors of a genteel limestone building in well-heeled Lowell's Tracey Avenue. The bar is unmarked, without a single sign outside the building disclosing its existence, and one who doesn't know better might as well be passing by a private residence. The discreetness is intentional - entrance is restricted only to members and their guests, or those who care to shell out $5,000 a year for access to an easful private setting where million-dollar deals can be closed and work-wearied minds can unwind over choice wine or an artisan beverage.

Most notable of all, it is the only bar in New York City which fronts operations of a covert international escort concierge service.

If you'd told him a year ago that he would contract the services of an escort agency, he would have laughed at you and called you mad. To him, the word 'escort' brought to mind images of… well, bluntly, porn stars, peddled in the poorest of tastes through sleazy internet pages for any Tom, Dick or Harry with enough cash to burn for the weekend– not exactly the style of a high flying mergers and acquisitions lawyer with a twenty million dollar trust fund from his mother's late father, bless Viktor Leventhorpe-Rath's dear soul.

But Auren Heim was different. Well-funded and evenly well-managed, the company knew exactly where it stood in the industry of its trade, and precisely how to service its meticulously-selected patrons so as to maintain its apex position. The entire business framework was organized, communication channels were tightly secured, and every step of its operations was carried out with utmost finesse. Its understatedly refined website was accessible only to members with private accounts pre-authorized by an administrator, and had once been described by a thoroughly impressed new client with the words "Why is this not in Vogue Italia?"

Not surprisingly, there was a price to be paid for security and sophistication. Sheer access to the service cost the hefty buy-in of a hundred thousand dollars, in addition to agreement to a twenty-page memorandum of finely printed terms, conditions and stipulations tailored to bind a patron to the enterprise and dissuade harmful actions against it in the future. That is, if you can identify an existing client and convince him to endorse your bid for association, and then ultimately win over the only person who can approve admission and personally extend the invitation to become a patron: its founder Isobel Flemming.

The elevator opens, and he steps out to the foyer of a finely appointed penthouse apartment. On paper, the fourth and fifth floors of the property are declared to be the private residence of Ms. Flemming, owner of Legato and lessor of 407 Tracey Avenue; in actuality, only the fourth floor is kept privately for Isobel. The fifth floor – a luxe suite of tastefully blended French fittings straight out of a chateau in Vallee de Loire – is one of three private properties in New York held in reserve for Auren Heim patrons who may fancy spending a few hours or the night in a place other than their own residence or a metropolitan hotel.

There's an ageless grace to the dentil-crowned coffer ceilings and subtly textured panel walls that would have been enough to make an unversed guest pause in admiration, but he – he ignores all of it. Instead, he heads straight to the bedroom, and there he finds the one thing he did not stop until he was acquainted to Isobel Flemming for, the one thing he paid a hundred thousand dollars to join Auren Heim for, the one thing he leaves everything to see every fucking Tuesday night for, no matter what it took.

"Caroline."

She's standing before the Palladian windows, a daint glass of merlot in hand, gazing at the tableau of brightly coloured lights glowing against the cloud-dimmed canvas of gray and black that is Lowell's July skyline. The knee-length hem of her pastel pink dress sways gently as she turns to him when she hears him call her by her real name, and she lifts her hand to swiftly tuck stray strands of her sidewsept hair behind her ear before her green eyes meet his blues.

"You're here again." She says softly. The expression on her face - neither blank nor easily readable (Did he hope that she would be happy to see him?) - makes his chest tighten.

"Did you expect me not to be?"

"No, I just..."

Her words fade into a faint, resigned smile, and it's enough to bring him relief. He walks towards her, and she puts her drink down on the nearby table to help him remove his coat jacket. By the time he's undone his tie and folded his shirt sleeves up his arm, she's handing him an old fashioned glass of scotch.

He accepts it without a word, follows her as she sits down on the edge of the bed. He drinks until he feels the alcohol burn a bitter line down the column of his throat, aware the entire time that her eyes are on him.

Yes, he's here again. Today, Tuesday, the only day in the week when she offers herself to any man in Auren Heim's patron list who's willing to pay a thousand dollars for each of the three hours she's willing to commit herself to him. With a face like hers, that would be many a man, but Isobel Flemming has kindness left in her grit-hardened, entrepreneurial heart, glorified brothel madam as she might be.

"Look, Mr. Mikaelson - Klaus. I hold you and your intentions in high regard, but rapid returns on investment is the foremost concern on a business model like this. So long as you're willing to pay her rate, I won't let anyone else have her. But if a day comes when you get a call saying 'She's on deck for three hours' and you reply with an answer other than the transaction code of your payment, she will go to whoever is willing to pay for her."

He swallows the last of his bourbon, pausing to breathe in the lingering scent of her sandalwood and jasmine perfume before opening his eyes and turning to her.

"I have something for you."

The smile on her face turns from resignation to one of gratefulness as she eyes the familiar dimensions of the thin brown box he shows her. She knows what's inside even before she opens it, because he gives her the same gift each time he goes away on a foreign trip. The first time he brought her back a present, he gave her a bracelet from an antique jeweler in Germany who'd said it once belonged to a princess; but she wouldn't accept it no matter what he did to assure her that it was a gift that was his to give. On his subsequent trips, he decided to bring back framed drawings - sketches he drew himself - of the places he visited.

The one she now holds in her hands is one of a skillfully drawn monument-fountain. Rows of broad-leafed Plane trees line a rectilinear pool of water, gracefully stretching lengthwise to end in an artful sculpture of what appears to be a Cyclops looking down at a mortal couple from a ledge of earth. A note on the bottom corner of the drawing reads Fontaine de Medicis, Jardin du Luxembourg, Paris.

She inhales, deep but quiet. Every time he gives her one of his sketches, she feels equal amounts of gratitude and guilt. Gratitude, for everything he does for her; guilt, because she knows she doesn't deserve any of it. More than once, she's gone to Legato thinking that it was going to be the night when she'd finally tell him that she wants him to stop seeing her...

She shakes off the pensive thoughts, forcing a happier expression as she places the frame back on its box before carefully setting it aside. "I take you enjoyed your trip then."

"I went to the Luxembourg Garden. Lovely change from the crowdedness of Louvre." He answers with a nod.

"So you're telling me that you gave up staring at the Madonna of the Rocks for a stroll in a garden. Who are you and what did you do to Klaus?"

Her expression of mock alarm makes him laugh. She knows him too well – his affinity for the arts, his favourite paintings, the fact that he's had more than one trip to Paris spent entirely at art museums. And for the most part, it fills him with hope. It could just be that she's very attentive – which she is – but he'd rather believe that she remembers these things about him because she does care for him.

"Summer isn't exactly the best time to visit the Louvre, unless you're in the mood to run into a thousand other tourists. So I went somewhere less packed out."

"It's Paris. Aren't you going to run into a thousand other tourists anywhere you go?"

The smile that his lips curl into is kind but tinged with wistfulness. The two of them can go on discussing places of interest in Paris for the next four hours, just like all the Tuesday nights they've spent sipping wine over conversations about classical Russian novelists, Japanese Cuisine, or whether or not Totilas can make a comeback with Matthias Rath on his reins. ("Yes," she'd told him firmly. "If Edward Gal changes his name to Matthias Rath.") But those conversations will never do anything about the fact that one of them is the privileged son of an influential family who has seen much of the world and has enough money to see it again ten times over, while the other is a struggling medical student who moonlights as an escort to pay her hospitalized brother's bills and hasn't really been anywhere.

He'd always dreamt of the day when he could change that. And maybe…

"You would have loved Jardin du Luxembourg." He tells her honestly. "It was built for a queen. Verdant lawns, ironed and pressed walkways, groves of apple and pear trees shading everything. And perhaps the most beautiful beds of tulips and hyacinths in France."

"…and the fountain you drew?"

"La Fontaine Medicis. Commissioned by Marie de Medici in the 1600's as her palace was being constructed. The sculptures have been replaced several times over the centuries, and now you have a bronze Polyphemus discovering Acis and Galatea in white marble."

She would have told him that it sounded lovely – and really, it did – but she catches herself before her lips even part to say a word. It's difficult enough to be seeing him like this, and she'd learned a long time ago to pay attention to the things she would tell him, if only to ensure that he wouldn't have to reply with something that he shouldn't be saying to her. She tilts her head, ready to steer the conversation to a different direction.

But then -

"I'll show you, one day…"

One day.

Her hands ball into tight fists in her lap. In her head, she hears the fateful sound of something shattering in her chest.

(Restraint?

Control?

Dare she say it - her heart?)

The change in her expression doesn't escape him. Immediately, he's on his feet, hands reaching out to tend to her.

"Are you al–"

"Don't - don't touch me!"

She can sense the sick feeling of bile rising into her throat, and she staggers away from him, her back hitting the oddly cold surface of the cushioned headboard. The sight of her recoiling from him drains all the colour from his face, replacing it with a pallid hue which reads only of pained confusion.

"Caroline –"

Her eyes bore straight at his. Green orbs burn fiery brown with the harsh glare of rage and resentment, while the glint of hurt and helplessness peak from the turbulent surface. Her hands are shaking, even when she clenches them tight.

"Does it blind you?" She grits out, voice almost breaking. "This – does this all trick you into thinking that there's a 'we', a 'one day' for us?"

"Calm down, love -"

"Don't be a fool, Klaus. I know who you were with in Paris."

His chest constricts, and it feels as though the brilliant flash of white-hot light that suddenly rips through the overcast skies strikes him right in the heart. It takes but a few moments for thunder to bellow angrily in the air, and with it bullets of gust-swept water begin rapping against the lead-tempered window panes.

Ink-dark dampness bleeds into the arid gray of paved concrete avenues, and soon the torrential downpour is drenching the entirety of Manhattan. Pedestrians caught outside scurry for shelter as the din of thunder continues to roll across the sky, the rainfall from above splashing over rain that's barely settled on the streets below. The storm – long brewing and now unbound – has begun; still, he merely stands before her, her question hanging limply in the space between them.

"You can't say her name, can you?" she says, softer now, but it's not as though saying it less loudly would make it any less painful. "Camille. Camille O'Connell. It was in the papers the other day: Governor Mikaelson receives French leadership award. Right next to a picture of your family, with your brother, your Mom, you and Camille –"

"There is no me and Camille," He insists, adamant now. "Father's launching his bid for presidency next year and he's rounding up all the chips he can play for the primary. He knows how Cami feels for me, the O'Connells hold Florida tighter than the Bennetts have Michigan and Ohio, and he can use her family's influence to his advantage. That's the only reason why he even invited her and Keiran to go."

She shakes her head. She feels so bitter she can almost taste it.

And maybe... maybe she deserves it.

"You really don't see it, do you?"

"No, I see exactly what you're doing. You're using this to push me away. You want to make this look like it matters – but I'm telling you, Caroline, it doesn't. The only thing that does is -"

"When you told me you were going to Paris, I didn't ask, I didn't say anything. Because I know my place. I'm just an escort – no, I'm actually worse than an escort, because you pay for me every week and I don't even sleep with you. I'm just a girl who takes your money."

"That's not –"

"You should know your place too, Klaus. You're Mikael Mikaelson's son. There's a girl out there who's in love with you. She's beautiful, she's intelligent, she comes from a prominent family who can give you everything, even a ticket to the White House. You're better off with Camille and we both know it. So please - please don't promise 'one day' to some gold-digging whore who doesn't deserve it."

Her lips are trembling now, and he can see how hard she's trying to fight the tears that spring to her eyes, misting hazel-green with clear regret. She averts her gaze downward, staring at the hands now tightly gripping the pleated fabric of her dress.

"I – I can't do this anymore… I'll just tell Isobel to give you back what you paid - God, I should've done this sooner – please, just go. Leave me alone. I can't – I don't want to see you… ever again."

Something turns in the pit of his stomach - a screw twisting deeper and deeper into his gut, cutting through him like a dull knife through aged leather. Rain continues to batter the city outside, furious and merciless, and yet he can barely hear it.

Instead, a vicious pounding reverberates in his head, one with the throbbing sensation that suddenly surges through his entire body.

(Whether it's from pain or anger, he cannot tell.)

"Do you know why I ended up going to Jardin du Luxembourg?"

"Please, Klaus, just go -"

"Because Camille told me that she wanted to see Louvre, and I couldn't bear the thought of going there and showing the Madonna of the Rocks to a girl who isn't you. So I told her I was meeting someone elsewhere and told Elijah to go with her. And I went to Jardin du Luxembourg alone, with nothing but sheets of paper and a charcoal pen so I could draw something to bring back to you. And the entire time I was there the only thing I could think of was that one day I would take you to Paris and show you everything. Did your newspapers tell you that?"

She keeps her head hung low, but that doesn't stop him from seeing the streams of tears that spill from her eyes. The last thing he wants to do is to hurt her – but he has to say it, he has to make her hear it.

"And this – do you really think I look at you and think, I just bought myself a three thousand dollar whore? I know you would have slept with me if I'd demanded - but I'm not here to buy your body. All I want is to give you back your freedom, so you don't have to be with anyone you don't want to be with, even if that includes me. Do you understand? Do you know why I'm doing this?"

"Klaus -"

He can take none more. He grips her by the shoulders, desperately pulling her closer to him, both hands wresting her face to lift her head to bring her eyes level to his. Her skin feels flushed against the palm of his own cold, trembling hand, and he has never felt a more indescribable feeling – of joy and pain and all the other things that he cannot put a name to – than when he looks straight into her eyes and she looks right back at him, those teeming green orbs telling him all too clearly that her tears are not of hatred or fury or grief – they are for him.

"Because I love you, Caroline. And if you can just let yourself believe it…"

It breaks her and it breaks everything. The anger and the anguish melts into a flood of warmth that drowns him like a blazing sea as she lets it all go, her hands fisting their way to clutch at his shirt, dampened cheeks finding the crook of his neck. She sinks into him completely, bare shoulders shuddering with each raw sob that escapes her lips.

It's as if time stops. The world around him slowly fades into oblivion. She is the only thing he sees, the only thing he feels, the only thing that matters. He doesn't even notice the briny beads of water have come to blur his sight – until the raw quivering of her voice against his skin makes him close his eyes, and a lone tear rolls down his face.

It is only then that he finds the strength to take her into his arms and hold her tight.

"I love you. Believe me, I love you." he hears her say.

And it's all that he ever needs to know.

-o-

The storm outside rages on, but she quells the one inside him with a hand splayed over his wildly beating heart.

He presses his forehead against hers, and she fights a smile through her tears as she cradles his face in her hands. He smiles at her in turn her, biting back a muffled chuckle of amusement at everything that has happened, even as he feels the stinging salinity still teeming from his own eyes. They have told each other everything that they need to say, even as the words remain unspoken.

She tilts her head, allowing his lips to find hers. It's gentle at first, their lips barely grazing; until she lets him in willingly, and he replies with the slow descent of his mouth on hers, capturing her in a long, drawn-out kiss. Her tongue dances with his to a surge of warmth and honesty held back too long but now at last unleashed, filling him with the taste of wine and honey and sunlight and life that he all too gratefully drinks in. She's kissing him the way he's wanted her to for a long, long time, and he has never felt more alive.

Her hands slide down to the sinewy planes of his chest, feather-light touch speaking of want too earnest for him to deny as her fingers fumble to unbutton his oxford shirt. His own arms drift from the base of neck to the porcelain smoothness of her bare back, deftly unfastening the zipper securing the strapless, flowing garment around her body. For a moment he thinks about stopping and asking her if this is what she really wants, assure her that she does not have to give him anything she doesn't want him to have; but the second he feels her tug at his shirt to take it off, revealing a lithe, chiseled figure like Acis to her yielding Galatea, he knows he already has her answer. He obliges her silent request, and soon his clothes are slipping off his shoulders and onto the carpeted floor, not too far from the heap of pastel pink chiffon and black lace.

He breaks their kiss to finally take in the sight of the naked woman in his arms. The arresting green of her heavy-lidded eyes, the quiet rise and fall of her milk-splashed chest, the rose-pink tips of her full, taut breasts, beckoning him to touch and taste and please her until she was shattering in bliss - he curses under his breath, hardly able to contain the need she makes his body pulse wildly with. To him, she has always been beautiful; but he thinks that she's even more so now, knowing that she feels the same way he does for her.

But he doesn't just want a fuck. He wants her to know, to feel, to believe everything he everything that he cannot put into words. There are a million definitions of love, but the one he chooses is what he feels whenever he's beside her.

She smiles inwardly while watching him take in the sight of her, aware of how hard he's been trying to keep himself in check. She leans in to kiss him again, closing her eyes and breathing out calmly as she feels his hands travel to her nape and the small of her back, lowering her languidly on the bed. Blonde hair spills into the sheets like gilded strands of silk against a creamy sea of threaded cotton when her head hits the pillow.

He moves swiftly to shift his body on top of hers, legs wedged between her thighs, parting them open while his lips move tenderly down the curve of her slender neck. She slackens her limbs to grant him access, inhaling slowly when she finally feels his thick, hard length poised against her. There is no trace of anxiousness or qualm in her mind or in her heart – only an inexplicable certainty that she loves him. Her hands slide over his shoulders, and he smiles softly when he hears her whisper his name.

He eases himself into her, an inch at a time, the veins in his arms protruding hardily as he holds himself above her, relishing the intoxicating feel of her slick, heated flesh clutching him tight. Their breaths are both bated now, and he bites into his lower lip to hold back a rasp groan when her hips buck instinctively, trying to get more of him in.

He forces himself to maintain control – he doesn't want to hurt her – and he might have been able to keep the sober pace he had set, if Caroline hadn't lifted her gaze up to his eyes and parted her lips to utter "Klaus…please…"

She's the one person he can never deny.

He closes his eyes and lets go. He sinks himself into her up to the hilt, and she arches her back frenziedly in bliss, unable to hold down a low-throated cry as he fills her completely in one swift move. He's hot and hard and just heavenly inside her, and oh, God, it feels so good –

"Yes, it does," he says between short-winded breaths, an appreciative smirk forming on his lush lips.

(She never even realized that she'd said it out loud!)

He gives her a few seconds to adjust to him, reveling in the feel of being sheathed in her silken warmth, ripples of lust running throughout his entire body and seemingly reverberating unto hers.

When he feels her flesh begin to thrum around him, he slowly pulls out, withdrawing until only his head is still inside of her. She moans grudgingly in complaint, not wanting him to go - and then he rams into her once more, seizing another ravished cry from her lips, beginning an ardent but soothing rhythm that sets every nerve on her body on fire.

His strokes are gentle and firm, tender and rough, giving and demanding all at the same time, and she has never lost herself in pleasure this staggering. She's gripping his shoulders hard, ankles pressing against the small of his back as she wraps her legs around his torso, her hips furiously rocking to meet each of his insistent thrusts. The friction between her legs is deliriously maddening, and every time he drives into her, it feels a little more difficult to breathe. They move like that for seconds, minutes, hours – who knows? All that matters is the feel of him against her, earnest and honest.

He growls hotly in her ear – something about being close – and her body writhes underneath him as he continues to thrust into her heat. Her nails dig against his skin, her teeth clenching forcefully as she feels that distinctive coil of tension knotting in her stomach. Her eyes start to roll to the back of her head, and –

"Caroline - "

"…H-hm…"

"I love you."

The fireworks are beautiful, even amidst the rain.

-o-

"Marry me."

She wakes up to the waning drizzle of the spent storm. A quilted blanket is wrapped around her tired, limp body, and yet the warmth that she basks in is not of the cloth covering her naked form, but of the broad, bare chest pressed against her back and a light but strong arm resting protectively around her waist. She smiles weakly before slowly turning to her side, and he must have been awake for a while by then, because when she turns to face him, he already knows what to say.

"Marry me. I'll take care of everything, just – I can't not be with you. Not after tonight."

Her eyes gaze intently into his, lips parting slightly upon hearing what he just said.

"Don't think about my father, I know him and I know he'll understand." He tells her sincerely. "We'll sort everything out later. The only thing that matters is that we're together."

A lump forms in her throat. She loves him, God knows she does - and there is no other man she wants to spend the rest of her life with, but...

"Klaus… You know Damon needs me."

He does. She has told him before of her brother, the reason why she had decided to work at Auren Heim in the first place. Stuck with a mother who cared about her friends more than she cared about her son and step-daughter, Damon Salvatore had taken it up to himself to look after Caroline after his step-father William died... until he was involved in a car accident two years ago, from which he has never woken up. She'd sold everything she owned that held any value to pay for every operation, treatment and medication that her brother needed; and eight months ago, with one year of medical school left for her to finish and there was nothing else she could sell - she sold herself.

He doesn't even blink. His reply is swift, dead certain. "I'll pay for everything. Whatever your brother needs -"

"Please, Klaus – I can't let myself drag you into this." She tells him with a shake of her head. "It's not just about the money. My stepmother, Lily – she's Damon's guardian and conservator because she's his closest relative, but she barely takes care of him. She sits in the hospital and pays for some of the bills, but it's always been up to me and Elena to look after him and settle everything. Lily won't let him go because he's bound to inherit three hundred thousand dollars worth of matured bonds from Daddy's estate when he turns thirty next year, and as long as he's not awake, Lily gets control of that."

"I'll send Kai to negotiate a buy-out, or we'll take her to court for the guardianship. If three hundred thousand dollars is what it costs to get your brother and free you from all of this, I'll pay it."

"No, you don't know Lily. If she learns that you're willing to pay her for my sake – she'd never let him go, she'd use him to get to me and find a way to take more money off of you or your father. Please, I couldn't live with myself if she threatens you or your family…"

He breathes in brokenly, sharp and deep. "Are you telling me that you can't be with me?"

She lifts her hand and gently strokes his cheek. He leans in against her touch, savoring the warmth of her hand against his skin, praying that he'll never have to know another morning without her by his side.

But the world is cruel.

"I'm telling you that I want to be with you. But I can't. I can't let Lily know that we're together, I can't let you get caught in this mess."

He closes his eyes, willing himself not to show her even a single trace of the pain her words cause her to feel. If that's her decision… he has to respect it.

"...What are you going to do then?"

"I… I'll wait this year out. Finish medical school, find a residency, let Lily have Damon's inheritance. He'd be of no use to her once she has his money, and by then she'll want him off her hands because she'll have to pay for his bills. And then I can take care of him and we could…"

She's looking at him from lowered lashes, and he can't do anything but take her into his arms once more. She rests her head on the crook of his neck, lips slightly trembling."

"I'm not asking you to wait for me… If you realize you don't..."

Her voice fades into silence as he presses a chaste kiss atop her forehead. She swallows a sob as she closes her own eyes, her hands wordlessly finding his, fingers lacing together and holding tight.

If he needn't think of anyone else, he wouldn't care what her step-mother did. He'd give her the world and protect her from anyone who tried to hurt her with everything that he had. But he knows how important her brother is to him, and he himself would rather not drag his father in a situation that could imperil Mikael's reputation if there was any other choice.

One year, he thinks to himself.

He can do that. He'll wait for her – however long it takes.

-o-

It's a Tuesday evening like many other nights before it. The second floor of the bar is half-filled with patrons sipping $25 craft-cocktails or $200 bottles of wine under dimmed pendant lights, engaged in soft-voiced conversation on subjects too broad-ranging to abridge in a decent-length sentence. The skies outside are overcast, seemingly ambivalent whether the night will be warm with updraft or cold with rain – but none of the people inside care, anyway. It's barely 7, and Legato closes at 12.

She steps into the platform, lace shift dress hugging her body loosely as she takes her seat in front of the microphone. She smiles at the pianist, nodding at him briefly to let him know she's ready to start her hour. The Tuesday before, she ended with Buble's A Foggy Day, soft and cozy like all of the easy-listening songs the piano lounge part of the bar is known for; today she begins with something that has never been sung in Legato before.

And unlike all her past nights, where she would glance at each of her audience for a short but earnest while, for this song her eyes turn to one man alone.

So remember when we were driving, driving in your car
Speed so fast it felt like I was drunk
City lights laid out before us and your arms felt nice
Wrapped around my shoulders
And I - had a feeling that I belonged
And I - had a feeling that I could be someone,
Be someone

An hour later, when he comes to see her in the penthouse, he smiles as she wraps her arms around his neck, standing on her toes to kiss him. He kisses her back, kind and giving and patient.

I'm here. I'm still waiting.

And for now, it is enough.

-o-

A/N:

1. Inspired by Fast Car by Tracy Chapman, one of my all-time favourite songs, and one that never fails to fill me with feels whenever I hear it. :) Like it? Hate it? Feedback is always appreciated.

2. Especially for Yanabear (aka klarolinecuddling) and Elise (aka kataccolaforever), who are the first Klaroline friends I think of whenever I hear the words 'New York' and 'Paris'.

3. In case you guys are wondering about how they met, nine months before this oneshot took place Klaus was getting over Genevieve who cheated on him with Jackson who's a bitter rival of his and there was this ball that he was going to and Genevieve and Jackson who were together now were going to be there and Enzo is such an awesome best friend and he couldn't let Klaus go there solo and guess what, the git is an Auren Heim patron so he talks to Isobel about needing a beautiful smart girl who can hold her own in the ball-full of lawyers and piss Genevieve off when she sees her with Klaus - but this girl has to be new because the governor's son cannot be caught walking around with an escort who might already be known to some bigshot lawyer with an Auren Heim membership at the ball. Klaus is hesitant at first because - well Enzo did just set him up with an escort (and told him that he can fuck her afterwards if he wants because Enzo's paying her by the hour anyway) but then the girl is Caroline and it's sparks all over and the next thing he knows, he's asking for her every time he needs a date. And then there's a whole other shitload of drama and he realizes he's in love with her but of course Caroline knows better than to take the plunge with him, so he ends up running around New York trying to get Isobel to let him into Auren Heim and I really should just make the oneshot instead of writing this 500+ word note.

4. As always, erica-dreams-in-colour at tumblr for gif's, manips, rants and other attempts at relevance; for my multi-chapter fics please see she. dreams. in. colour, links are in my profile page.