AN: A bit of a slow start so bear with me for a bit. I anticipate about a dozen or so chapters for this story.

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"So, I arrested a suspect in a murder case today," Nick began, as he took a seat at the head of the table next to Adalind. Their twenty-month-old son Kelly was in a high chair between them, making a mess out of his plate of food. He would require a bath, as no amount of wiping off was going to rid him of the spaghetti-o's, or whatever they appeared to be, from his hair and body. It was Nick's turn, too, and Kelly was apparently going to make him work at it.

"That's good," Adalind said, digging into her pasta, which was a more respectable version for adults: lasagna. Nick could tell her tone was one of companionable acknowledgement; a couple sharing the highs and lows of their day, filling the silences between bites.

"As I'm reading him his rights, he tells me he gets turned on by petite blondes and sassy women, too," Nick added conversationally, and Adalind paused in her chewing, fork poised midair to her mouth with her next bite, and slid her eyes to Nick.

Nick smiled, annoyed, back at her and she huffed a sigh and rolled her eyes, and continued eating.

"It's the gift that keeps on giving," he said, referring to the Portland's Hottest Civil Servant charity that he had been volunteered for against his knowledge, and mostly against his will, to participate in a few months back. Due to his, and more accurately Adalind's, efforts he had raised quite a bit of money for the arts council resulting in his selection for the annual calendar, which was where they apparently put most of the information from an incredibly invasive questionnaire, which Adalind had taken care of without him knowing until it was too late to change it or take any of the information back.

It went without saying that it was forever June in Adalind's office. The blasted calendar that had resulted from his forced participation in the charity event hung on the side of one of her file cabinets with his mug on prominent display, 24/7, 365 days a year. Worse still was the little snippet of information taken from the questionnaire she had filled out for him in a text box down in the corner that, so far, most of the station, four murder suspects, seven victims, and about 500 random people on the street referenced whenever they saw him and made the connection.

It made his job interesting, to say the least, and he already thought his job was plenty interesting what with Wesen, the uprising, and the resistance. Hank and Wu brought him coffee for a month when the calendar had first been released since he couldn't so much as order a cup without someone recognizing him, and then every head in the shop would turn once someone pointed him out. Not to mention some of the comments they made. Case in point: The murder suspect he had arrested this afternoon.

"Did you tell him he had excellent taste, then?" Adalind asked, and Nick gave her a look. She bit down a smile and forked another bite of lasagna in her mouth.

"No, I debated on shooting him," Nick replied. "Fortunately for him there were witnesses."

"Well, I thought you looked devastatingly handsome," Adalind replied, "I was disappointed you didn't make the holiday spread, but I suppose it would be unfair to imply you were anyone else's present to unwrap but mine," she said, grinning. He flashed another dark look at her, and thought maybe he would use the murder suspect comment to his advantage later tonight, after they put Kelly to bed. Dish out punishment. Problem was, she liked the punishment, and Nick, while most days mildly to moderately aggravated by the lingering effects of the charity function, enjoyed the fact it gave him the opportunity to cash in on her sympathy.

"How was your day?" he asked, letting the calendar and charity brouhaha go for the time being.

She shrugged and took a sip of water. "Berman gave me the Lizstein contract," she said, and Nick looked up in surprise.

"That's good, right? It's supposed to be a really big client for your company." She had mentioned it a few times, that if they closed the deal they would gain quite a bit of revenue from their representation and the resulting billable hours. It went without saying that the lawyer attached to it would have a lot of responsibility and a very high profile.

"Yeah," she agreed, and Nick frowned, wondering why she wasn't more enthusiastic about landing what appeared to Nick to be quite the honor.

"And you're unhappy because..." he said, trying to figure out what the problem was.

She sighed and put her fork down, biting her lip. "I'm not unhappy," she said after a moment.

"You're not ecstatic because..." he said.

"It's a really nice honor, I mean, it's a very nice compliment Berman is paying me with the gesture."

"But?"

She pushed her plate back and folded her arms near the edge of the table. "It's going to mean a lot of work, Nick. A lot of late nights, and weekends, and long days."

"You're worried about Kelly?"

"Kelly. You," she said, and Nick frowned. "I mean—when am I ever going to see both of you? There are days now when I'm working or you're working and go in at the crack of dawn and don't leave until well after dark. You're called out to crime scenes at any given time, and not to mention if they need you for something at the Wall, or something comes up Wesen related. It's a lot on Kelly. It's a lot on you." She bit her lip again. "It's a lot on me. Don't get me wrong. I love my work, but sometimes, it just seems too much. I miss you guys. I feel like I'm missing out on a lot of important things, and I don't want Kelly getting shuffled around all the time from one caregiver to another. Rosalee's been great, but she helps you and Monroe quite a bit, and what happens when the time comes when she wants to focus on a family of her own?"

Nick set his own fork down. Rosalee and Monroe starting a family had been something on his own mind lately. It had not been too long ago that Rosalee had thought she was pregnant. Adalind had said she had been terrified but hopeful, and that was never more evident than when she had looked at the results of her pregnancy test and it was negative. Nick had witnessed the tears firsthand and the disappointment on Rosalee's face was still fresh in his mind after several months.

Nick and Adalind relied on them a lot, Nick more so, and it wasn't fair to their friends' relationship for him to keep demanding so much time away from each other. They should be allowed to live and work their own lives without getting sucked in to Nick's cases, or Grimm stuff every second of the day. Black Claw and the Wesen uprising had suffered a serious setback, and the resistance was only gaining momentum. Some of the stress there had eased, as more and more able bodies joined the fight against it. Nick knew Monroe was getting anxious about starting his own family, instead of being burdened with the responsibility of Nick's.

"You're right," Nick said. "We rely—I rely—on them too much. It shouldn't affect what they want to do, but don't let that make your decision on your case. You've been talking about it for a while. This is a great opportunity for you, and it won't be forever. We'd just have to make adjustments for a few months. We've lived through worse."

Adalind nodded, but she didn't look convinced. "I do this, and then there'll be another one. How long can we keep making the adjustments until we've got nowhere to go. I still want to be a mother to my son. I still want to come home at night and be able to give him his bath, and read him a story, and play with him. If I do this—he'll be in bed most nights before I even get home. The burden of taking care of him is going to all fall on you, Nick. He's a handful now with both us sharing the load."

She looked at Kelly, who turned his head to look at his mother as well, before giggling and playing with his food. There was nothing Nick loved more than Kelly, except maybe his mom, but she was right. He was an energetic, willful child.

"Well, what's the flip side of that? You tell Berman you appreciate the honor but you already have a full caseload," Nick said, "Or maybe there's someone who can shoulder most of the load? Lane?"

Adalind shook her head. "He can help, but Berman gave it to me because this is a huge deal to land them as clients and he knows I'll make sure everything goes as it should. We can't afford to give this to someone less experienced with handling this type of contract and client." She put a hand over her forehead.

"I feel like I miss all of Kelly's milestones. His first smile, his first tooth, his first words," Nick said. "If you decide to do this don't worry about us. This will be good father/son bonding time. Do what you need to do. We'll make it work. Maybe we can even hire Trubel as a nanny," Nick suggested with a grin. "She's got experience," he said, referencing her stint as a volunteer with Kelly's daycare when he had been under threat of kidnap from one of Adalind's coworkers involved in Black Claw.

Adalind snorted and flashed a wan smile, but she still looked troubled and Nick was struck by the fact that this must have been bothering her for some time now. He had had his misgivings about her going back to work, but other than a few hiccups here and there, and then the thing with Louis a few months ago, it hadn't been bad. There were times they were both scrambling to either pick up or drop off Kelly at his daycare, or find someone that could, usually Rosalee, but nothing that would justify Nick saying she needed to quit this experiment and stay home with their child. She had done that for a year without complaint, and Nick understood her enough to know it wasn't a fair or reasonable demand anyway.

It was also worth noting that they had benefitted greatly from the second, more plentiful income, too. Nick had been managing, but things had been tight trying to support two adults and one growing child on just Nick's detective's salary. They had both become accustomed to this new standard of living. If Adalind were to quit that meant no more daycare for Kelly, and loathe though he was to give that place any sort of credit, Kelly had been thriving in its environment. He was very intelligent and advanced for his age, and it wouldn't just potentially hurt Adalind if she were to resume her duties as a stay at home mom again, not that she couldn't or wouldn't take up with his education and development.

"We'll make it work," he said again, "Whatever you decide." Adalind nodded and smiled more confidently.

"I know."

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Life in the Schade-Burkhardt household was fairly tame, once you factored Black Claw, the resistance, and anything Grimm related out of it. Which mostly left the hours they spent sleeping, but occasionally they shared a morning or evening, or even, rarely, a whole weekend without any drama. A nearly normal couple raising their child, paying bills, doing dishes and other chores and bickering about mundane topics such as who kept forgetting to put the cap back on the toothpaste (Nick), who couldn't seem to pick their clothes off the floor (also Nick), and who clogged the shower drain with hair (Adalind).

The next morning started as it usually did: Adalind hustling around the loft trying to make herself and Kelly presentable and Nick, already presentable, drinking his coffee and trying to stay out of the line of fire. Kelly, however, was adding to the flames. He seemed to be especially perceptive to when his mother was agitated about something, or perhaps her nerves were feeding his, but he had already thrown a tantrum about the shirt Adalind tried to dress him in, and was currently giving Nick grief about eating his breakfast. Nick had taken over feeding him when it appeared Adalind might spontaneously combust when Kelly batted his breakfast off the highchair and across the room in a fit of temper.

"Kelly," Nick said, having tried airplane noises, Wesen noises, police noises, high pitched voice, low pitched voice, and now was resorting to a stern authoritative voice he typically used with difficult suspects. "Stop throwing your food and eat your breakfast."

Kelly stared at him wide-eyed, contemplating the seriousness of Nick's request, before deciding if Nick wasn't with him than clearly he was against him. Having no friends to be found in this particular loft, and already incited his mother's ire, he began to bawl, and Nick took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

Not exactly the capable dad impression he was hoping to leave Adalind with before her big meeting with Berman. He didn't want her to feel that he couldn't step up and handle things if she needed to take on more responsibility at her job. She had always stepped up and handled the minutiae with Kelly no matter his job or life as a Grimm had thrown them. He knew she didn't doubt his ability to protect Kelly, even though Nick usually did, but he hadn't had much opportunity to embrace the Mr. Mom role in their relationship.

He still heard the hairdryer going in the bathroom so there was still time to salvage the present situation.

"Kelly," he said, in his normal voice, picking his son up from his high chair. "Look, daddy's sorry, okay? Daddy's sorry." He rocked Kelly side to side while Kelly bawled. He placed a kiss on his temple and then rolled his eyes heavenward when Kelly wailed, "I want mama!"

Well, there was a ringing endorsement on Nick's parenting ability if ever he heard one.

"It's okay," Nick said.

"Mama!"

Swell.

Nick stood tossing Kelly gently above him, trying to get the tears to stop before Adalind finished drying her hair. "See? It's okay, you're okay." He tossed him a few more times, Kelly slowly quieting his crying, a troubled expression on his face. He tossed a couple more times for good measure and set him down with another kiss on his cheek. Kelly wriggled out of his grasp, and moved on to some of his toys.

There was still the matter of breakfast. They fed him at the daycare, he usually had a mid-morning snack, followed by lunch and a midafternoon snack. Maybe he could pack something extra in his baby bag so Kelly would have it when he got hungry.

Adalind would probably kill him if she came out to find her son still half-dressed, unfed, and Nick not helping to facilitate either of those things.

He heard Kelly chatter to himself and his toys but he didn't seem particularly interested in playing, either. Nick frowned. Well, dressing him was the easiest to remedy, so he attempted that first.

By the time Nick got the shirt over his son's head, he had calculated that he had dealt with Siegbarste that were more cooperative than Kelly.

"What is your problem this morning, buddy? Did you wake up on the wrong side of the crib?"

Adalind walked by Nick, who was carrying a fussy, and frankly not delightful, Kelly, dressed in an almond colored slip, trimmed with almond colored lace, her breasts jostling attractively with each step. He trailed after her, watching her open one of the doors of the armoire and selected a crème colored dress, with black accents on the sides.

"Need any help?" Nick asked, setting Kelly on his feet. Kelly wandered aimlessly around the room still irritable. Adalind flashed Nick a frazzled look, and then nodded.

"If you could zip me," she said slipping into it and turning around so her back was to him. Nick nodded and stepped forward and was accosted by the heady mix of her perfume and body wash. He slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her against him.

"Nick," she said.

"What? I can't help it if you smell really good…and you look really good," he murmured, placing a lingering kiss against her neck, her collarbone, just under her ear. "You feel really good."

"I can't be late. I need to get there early and let Berman know my decision."

"Which is?" Nick said, straightening a little.

"I'm…I'm going to do it."

"That's great," Nick said, and hoped he sounded sincere.

"Really?" she said, turning to face him.

"Absolutely. You're going to knock it dead."

"You sure you'll be okay? Kelly—"

"I told you. We'll figure it out. You do what you need to do. It won't be a problem."

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"Burkhardt," Nick said into the handset at his desk. He clicked on the email with the subject autopsy results and scrolled through the pictures to the conclusion.

"Yes, is this Detective Nicholas Burkhardt?"

"Yes, this is Detective Burkhardt," Nick said distractedly. Excision of heart, liver and tongue?

"This is Felicia, Kelly's caregiver down at—"

"I know who you are," Nick interrupted, suddenly focused on the conversation. "Is everything okay?" He was suddenly tensed, wondering if someone had tried to get at his son again.

"Well, I'm afraid Kelly's running a fever, so you'll need to come get him."

"Oh, well, of course," Nick said, and then immediately wondered who was free to do so. His first thought had been Adalind; she usually responded to these calls, and especially the ones where Kelly was ill, but she had called earlier this morning to tell him that Berman had clearly expected her to say nothing other than yes, as he already had her day lined up with meetings. She had lamented that she probably had seen daylight for the last time on her drive in to work, so Nick suspected she was out. Not to mention she was first on the daycare's call list, and they had both her contact numbers. If she hadn't answered either of those, she wasn't going to answer Nick's. Rosalee was doing some sort of inventory at the spice shop, he could call her, except the conversation between he and Adalind was still in the back of his mind, and he thought he might want to use the Rosalee Rescue Card later on, so he might want to save it and not cave the first day.

He glanced at the clock on his desk phone and frowned. He was supposed to join Hank for an interview with a witness at eleven o'clock, another twenty minutes from now.

"I could be there by noon," Nick said, looking at the clock again and calculating the time.

"Mr. Burkhardt, you need to come get your son immediately. He's running a fever and the other children are at risk for getting sick."

He probably got sick from one of your other children Nick thought uncharitably, but he stifled a sigh. Hank could handle the interview on his own, he supposed, but he still needed to go through the coroner's report and follow up on a couple of leads.

"All right," he said, "I'll be there as soon as I can," and hung up after Felicia's thank you.

He finished clicking through the rest of the autopsy report, and then forwarded it to Hank's email. He grabbed his coat off the back of the chair and knocked on Renard's door.

"Enter!"

"Captain, I'm going to need the rest of the day off. I need to pick up my son at daycare," Nick said when he reached Renard's desk. Renard looked up with a frown.

"Everything okay?"

"Yeah, Kelly's sick, apparently. He's running a fever and they won't let him remain there."

"Adalind's unavailable?"

"She's busy with a new high-profile case at her job. She'll be working a lot of extra hours for the foreseeable future until she finishes."

"Where are you at with the investigation?"

"Just got the autopsy results back. Victims liver, heart and tongue were excised."

"Ingredients for a spell?"

"Looks like," Nick agreed grimly. "It would fit with some of the things we found in the victim's home and at the crime scene."

Renard nodded. "Where's Hank at on the witness you brought in for questioning?"

"Uhh, we're supposed to interview him here shortly, but Hank is going to have to take the lead on that. The daycare was pretty insistent I need to pick up Kelly right away."

"Have Wu follow up with the victim's sister. I'll check in with Hank on the interview."

"Thanks." Nick had his hand on the door when Renard stopped him.

"Hope your son gets to feeling better."

"Me too."

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"Okay, buddy, let's get you down for a nap," Nick said, throwing up the elevator gate and dropping Kelly's baby bag on the floor. Kelly had been listless and irritable from the moment Nick picked him up, cheeks flushed with fever, and warm to the touch. He heard his phone buzz in his pocket, and fished it out.

"It's mommy," he told Kelly who just rubbed at his eyes with the back of a dimpled hand in frustration. He set Kelly down gently, running a hand over his light brown hair and brought the phone to his ear.

"Nick! I had two missed calls from the daycare. Did you get Kelly?" she asked anxiously.

"Yup, just got home from picking him up," Nick said. He dropped his car keys in the bowl on the entry table, and looked at his son. Kelly had moved a few feet into the room, but he was still moving about listlessly. He thought his cheeks looked especially red in the loft lighting and he held the phone between his shoulder and ear and opened the paper pharmacy bag he had with him.

"Is he okay? Felicia said in the message he had a fever?"

"Yup, looks like," Nick said, moving closer to his child. "He's pretty flushed. And cranky," Nick added, watching Kelly crinkle his brow in annoyance when his father ran his hand through his son's hair again.

"What's his temperature?"

"Uh, I think Felicia said it was a 101," Nick said.

"Have you taken it since then?" Adalind asked.

"No, we just got home like two minutes ago," Nick said.

"There's a digital thermometer in the bathroom, in the basket on the bottom shelf."

"I know that," Nick said, although truthfully he just knew they had a digital thermometer somewhere, having seen Adalind use it before a couple of times.

"You'll need to hold his head still, he doesn't really like it in his ear, but you only need to hold it until it beeps, it's like a couple of seconds."

"I think I can figure it out. He'll be fine, don't worry. Called Rosalee, I've got some baby Tylenol to help with the fever and I'm going to put him down for nap. We've got it covered," Nick assured.

"My poor baby," she lamented. "I should have known he wasn't feeling well, he was so unlike himself this morning," she noted. "He's never that unhappy in the morning."

"Well, I'm sure he'll be back to his usual ornery self in no time."

"Maybe I should come home, I'm sure you had a lot going on at work."

"And you don't?" Nick countered. "Hank and Wu got it covered. Adalind, we'll be fine."

"You're sure he's okay? He doesn't have the flu, does he? It's going around. Maybe you should get him in to see the doctor."

"No, he's not throwing up. I'm positive, we'll be fine, I can do some research for work from home, and you need to show Berman his faith in you is justified."

"Okay," she said uncertainly. "But call me if he gets worse or you need me. I told my assistant to come get me no matter what's going on."

"Not going to be necessary, but if anything more happens with Kelly I'll let you know," he said, watching Kelly toddle a few feet away from him. He spasmed and gagged, and promptly threw up all over himself. Nick widened his eyes in alarm and watched as Kelly did it again.

"You're right, I'm probably overreacting," He heard Adalind say.

"Mm-hmm," Nick said, looking frantically for a towel, and then said to Adalind, when it appeared Kelly might be getting ready to throw up for a third time, "Okay, love you, gotta go!"

He clicked the phone off as soon as he heard her respond in kind and snatched Kelly from his vomit covered spot on the floor. He managed to reach the bathroom before Kelly upchucked again, but unfortunately not before he upchucked all over both himself and Nick. Nick got him to the sink as he was finishing up, and Nick bit his lip staring down at his shirt, and Kelly began to cry.