B O D Y G U A R D AU | where klaus is caroline’s long-suffering bodyguard. they bicker and get on each other’s nerves constantly, but seem to have the horribly inconvenient tendency to be photographed smiling and stealing glances at the other. people can’t help but wonder.
The utter silence during the ride from the hotel to the festival unnerved Klaus. Although he definitely preferred the quiet to accompany the spectacular views Cannes offered, he'd gotten used to Caroline's endless chatter in the background. He fiddled with his earpiece, wondering if it had malfunctioned somehow. Seeing that it hadn't, he frowned and rapped lightly on the glass before lowering the partition, turning in the passenger seat to check in on her as they approached the entrance.
"What's going on back there?" he called out through the widening crack. "You've barely said a word since we left. Did you suck that mini bar dry or—" His barbed teasing was cut off when he got a look at her face, brow drawn into an uncharacteristic frown and the line of her mouth far too serious. If he was the type to be shocked over things, the sight before him would have done it. He'd never seen her like this, so small and... diminished.
She looked up at him and when he caught sight of her reddening ears and the pale pallor of her cheeks, he understood.
Could it be that Caroline Forbes, Hottest Breakout Star of The Year and award season darling, was actually nervous?
The chance to rub it in her face after all the months he'd suffered her childish pranks, incessant teasing and rebellions against his carefully constructed security detail proved an unholy temptation, but there was something in her eyes that stopped him before he could start. A rare glimpse of vulnerability that provoked an immediate instinct to huddle against and shield her from whatever was causing that little pucker of worry between her eyes.
He felt an insidious heat crawl through him as visions filled his mind of cornering her somewhere dark and private, pressing into the heavy folds of her skirt and licking the line of her throat until the rigid strain of her shoulders melted away under his palms.
Mortified at his body's reaction to thoughts of soothing her in the most primal way his depraved mind could think of, he forced himself to get a grip.
"You're going to do fine, sweetheart," he began, voice rough and low with the surprise of finding he actually meant it. "No need to be skittish."
Despite his reassuring tone, or perhaps because of it, she seemed to snap out of whatever fog of anxiety she'd been lost in.
"I'm not nervous," she replied testily, turning her haughty little nose up at the mere suggestion. Klaus rolled his eyes at his obviously misguided attempt to be considerate for once as the driver finally pulled up to the red carpet.
He couldn't resist adding, "Could've fooled me with that ghostly complexion, love," before sliding out of the car, convinced the offended squawk he heard before shutting his door had made this entire trip worth it.
That is, until he opened hers and saw the adorably outraged look that went along with it.
