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Klaus saw him. Just for a moment; speeding to Caroline and glimpsing for one fragment of a second the man from the other evening holding her. But then he vanished.

And he took her with him.

Sudden, unpredicted rage bloomed inside Klaus's chest and he found himself following after, trying to keep the vampire and Caroline in his line of sight. The roads, the houses, the trees blurred by in a smattering of of colors, bombarding him with a million different pixels as he ran.

The thickness of the trees he made it into obscured his view and a growl erupted from his mouth when he lost the trail a few miles into the forest. He wanted to find that vampire and show him exactly what going against him entailed. But the scent had evaporated and he could do very little of what he wanted.

Klaus came to a stop. He ran a hand through his hair, trying to calm whatever untamable beast had risen inside him. Well, her recklessness had finally paid off, he thought bitterly. And he had expected it to be him that wrought it instead of another.

Klaus's fists knotted at his sides. He should just let them go. This wasn't a rescue mission. He was no nobleman pursing after the damsel in distress. He never had been and wouldn't be.

But there was an undeniable part of him that called his bluff.

Careless girl, he chided, glowering at the direction he'd lost them in. That rage mounted and Klaus paused, vexed at his own emotions. He didn't understand it. He didn't want to. It wasn't very familiar to him, not this anger, not this vendetta against a vampire that had taken a human girl he was interested by. No. None of it was within reason or sense. It shouldn't have made him this angry.

And yet.

With an irritated sigh, Klaus sped on, going due north, the way he had hoped they'd gone.

So much for not intervening. Now Klaus was breaking that oath, choosing to be the hero once more.

He grimaced to himself as he ran.

Hero?

That was something he hadn't been in a very long time.

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My terror seemed to lock around my throat, rendering me incapable of breath. As we flew through the trees, my heart beating as if I'd run a marathon, I waited for him to do something. To say something. Maybe to kill me right then and there, but my captor didn't, and I was beginning to get dizzy from lack of breath. Dully, I remembered when the music stopped, after my iPod fell somewhere in the miles behind us.

Finally, the man paused, once breaking through the tree at the edge of the woods. I gasped for air, trying to move away from him. His hold could have been made from steel for all the success my efforts had, but I didn't give up, screaming once before his hand clamped over my mouth.

"Shh," he soothed, his breath moving my hair. My entire body vibrated and I rebelled, bucking back and trying to deliver my threat I'd given at the party. His grip tightened painfully and I sucked in my breath.

"Quiet, Doll," he murmured, turning me around to face him. I looked into those eyes once more, amazed at how human they were. But they were also the same eyes in my nightmares, the same ones I saw before I'd nearly died.

And I didn't want a repeat.

"We are just going to have a chat," he drawled, slowly releasing his hold on me.The second I felt his fingers disappear, I was running into the street. Running for my life.

I made it a yard.

He materialized in front me and I backtracked, changing directions. Into the woods was probably the worst place to go but I couldn't think. Everything inside was screaming at me to just get away.

The stranger appeared again, giving me a mocking look, his thick brows knitted together in a scorn. "Ah, ah, ah," he said, waving a finger in my face. "We are just having a small talk."

"I'm not interested," I snapped, surprising myself. And then regretted it. I swallowed back the lump in my throat, my heart hammering in my chest. "Fine," I said. "What do you want to talk about?"

He smiled slightly, just a little pull on the corner of his lip. His black hair shielded his forehead, in disarray from the run. "You seem to be....entertaining Niklaus Mikaelson, if that's indeed him. Is that true?"

That's what this was for? I asked myself, incredulous. I crossed my arms over my chest, desperate to look just a fraction calm. "By entertaining, you mean trying to get rid of? Then yeah. I've been entertaining him."

"You're a very foolish girl." He chastised. "With little to no regard for your own life."

I was really starting to get tired of people telling me that.

"Why?" I asked, my voice betraying me by wavering. "Because I think I can go for a run in my neighborhood? Yeah, I'm an adrenaline junkie."

At my words, the ground disappeared from beneath me and I was suddenly launched backward. Time seemed to still for a second before it sped up and my back smacked painfully against the ground, fire coursing up my limbs.

I gaped for breath but I was like a fish out of water, the air knocked from my lungs.

My nails dug into the ground reflexively as the man appeared, bending on his knees. His face hovered above mine.

"Such big talk for someone so weak." He tapped my nose and I tried to back away, army crawling from him. Air choked its way into my throat and I breathed raggedly into the ground. But then I felt his hands on my arms again and he pulled me to my feet, so quickly every joint screamed in pain.

His eyes met mine again. "See, what I'm so very eager to know is what Niklaus is doing with you. You aren't very significant, no offense," he shrugged. "I mean I feel like I'm missing something."

"You and me both," I wheezed, my body shaking from fear. I felt somewhat triumphant though that my voice didn't sound as terrified as I felt.

His hand whipped out and his fingers pressed over my throat, trapping my breath once more. I raked my nails down his hand, but it did nothing. Black dots exploded like ash across my vision.

"Niklaus is not someone to do anything without reason. If he's made....weakened by a human girl, he's not fit to be in the position he is," the man said, his words distant to my ears.

I was very close to losing consciousness but just before the curtain of darkness could drop, he let go, and I slid down the base of the tree he'd pinned me against. The air burned on its way in.

"Aren't you....afraid of him?" I gasped out, the words almost indistinguishable.

He heard, though. And he must not have liked it.

"I used to be," the man admitted, crouching in front of me. "But I knew him to be the man with the reputation for ruthlessness. Not for saving helpless little girls."

If I weren't so easy to overpower and if he were human, I would have been really insulted. Instead, I was just afraid.

"Are you planning to kill me?" I asked, my voice breaking on that word. My mom flashed to mind and I hated the idea of her grieving for me. Better yet, maybe each trace of me would disappear and she'd never know what became of her daughter.

The thought made tears well up to my eyes.

The man took a long, airy breath.

"No. Not yet."