A/N: I'm so sorry this took so long to update. Life went a little crazy last week.

V. Partners

He looks up from what looks like crime photos when she takes down the steps from their room to where he is sitting in the kitchen.

"Hey, what are you doing up? It's late, you should go back to bed."

She raises an eyebrow at his worried tone. "Shouldn't I be the one saying that?"

He shrugs as if dismissing the idea that he might need sleep. She sighs and goes to the teakettle. "Is it a Wessen case?"

"I don't know. I think so, but when we took Monroe to sniff around-

She snorts at that and he gives her a look. "Sorry."

"He couldn't detect anything unusual."

"So why do you think it's Wessen?" She sets down two mugs of tea on the table and pulls a chair by his side.

"Well," he pauses and looks at her from the corner of his eye. "Adalind, are you sure you want to hear about this?"

"Talking about it might help. At least it used to help me when dealing with a case." It's strange now remembering that life. Cases, papers, laws and court dates; it almost seem like it was someone else's life. "Walk me through it."

"Okay. Jack Colton, 19, part of the rowing and swimming team at his college. He was found drowned at the lake."

"Okay."

"It was a clear day on the same lake he swam since he was a kid."

"Improbable, but not impossible."

"He was dressed in street clothes. CCTV cameras have him on campus at 10 AM and he was found ten minutes after that at a lake that is at least half and hour away from campus by car on a good day. So how did he get there?"

"What did Monroe said?"

"That if there was something Wessen, he couldn't smell it. The rain must have washed it all away." She remembers then that it had been raining all day.

"Where there marks around the lake?"

"Like drag marks?"

"Yeah, or animal marks, anything?"

"Actually," he shuffles through the crime scenes photos. "There was this." The photo he hands her shows some indentations on the ground filled with water. "Monroe said they looked like horse tracks."

"They are, in a way." He frowns at her cryptic answer. "The rain, the lake, the marks and the drowning, they fit an old story my GroBtante used to tell me."

"Your GroBtante?"

"My mother's aunt." She went on before he could ask about her. That's not a story she wanted to tell. "It sounds like a Bäckahäst, a brook horse. But they didn't usually attack people. They were more interested in playing music than anything else. They are also supposed to be extinct."

"Extinct? How does that even happen?" She knows the how occurs to him when a slight blush covers his cheek.

"They get their power from the water, and they are pretty weak away from it. From what I remember of the stories, they can't Woge without water."

"But if it were raining, they would be able to Woge."

"It's more than that. They can't keep human shape when they are around water."

"That probably made them easy pickings for Grimms."

"Not just Grimms, the council was not very fond of them either. When you're trying to hide the existence of Wessen, there is not much place for Wessen that can't control their Woge." She looked down and flipped through some of the pictures. "Jack probably saw a beautiful horse on campus and had the brilliant idea to ride it. The Bäckahäst got spooked and ran home."

"Where it drowned the kid." He frowned.

"I told you, Bäckahäst didn't usually attack humans. But once someone gets on its back, they can't let go. My GroBtante used to tell me that Bäckahäst were made by the Alfar to ride the currents between the Nine Worlds. If you fall in those current you will be lost between the worlds for all eternity, so they made it impossible to fall." He looks at her as if she suddenly grew another head and she resist the urge to roll her eyes. Really, did he think Rosalie and Monroe were the only two Wessen that new anything about the Wessen world. Just because she doesn't have her powers anymore, doesn't mean she is not Wessen. "But no one has seen one in hundred of years."

"Maybe they just went into hiding, but are now coming out." There is a dark frown on his handsome face. "Occultatum Libera"

"You're thinking it has something to do with Black Claw?" She tries to keep the fear and worry out of her voice, but she knows she is not successful when he takes one of her hands in his. Electricity shoots up from that point of contact to her entire body.

"I'll be careful."

She sips her chamomile tea, desperate to focus on anything else besides his hand in hers. She used the last bit left of the tea leaves in the tin to make both cups. She'll need to go grocery shopping soon. "Just whatever you do, don't get on his back. Actually, I might have something that might help with that. I'm sure Rosalie will have the ingredients for it."

"A spell?" He raises a eyebrow looking at her doubtfully. "To do what? Breathe under water?"

"Yep." She can feel herself grinning and tries to temper it down, but it feels so good to be useful. "It should allow you to talk to the Bäckahäst. They don't exactly speak English when they are in horse form."

"That's a very specific spell." He raises an eyebrow and looks her with his cops eyes. She looks away and tries to appear nonchalant.

"I wanted one, when I was a little girl."

She ventures a look back at him and sees his lips curved in a smile. "Like a pony?"

"Every little girl wants a pony. I just wanted one that could ride to different worlds."

"Of course." There is laughter in his voice. He drinks his tea and looks at her from the corner of his eye. She can feel there is something he wants to ask her. "Alfar? Nine Worlds?" That's not what she expected he would ask.

"Elves? The Nine Realms where Wessen are from? Any of these ringing any bells?"

He shakes his head. "I didn't grow up knowing I was a Grimm. Seeing you Woge was the first time I even had an idea that there was anything like Wessen."

"Wow." She tries to imagine what that would have been like: living a normal human life with no idea of what was out there to then suddenly being able to see Wessen and being shoved in the middle of a war. "But you were raised by your aunt. Who was a Grimm."

"She never said anything until she showed up when I started to see Wessen." He looks down at his mug. "At first I thought I was going crazy." He smiles ruefully. "I even chased down and tried to attack Monroe."

"Well, he did used to attack people before he discovered the calming magic of pilates."

Nick snorts. "Those days I was running around with no idea what the hell was going on. It's a wonder I didn't get killed or killed someone innocent. I still don't know what's going on or what is what most of time." He shakes his head. "Elves? Really?"

"Yeah. There is probably something in your family's books."

He groans. "Those books were hard to browse through and find anything even before Juliette burned down the trailer. Nowadays is practically impossible finding anything."

She looks sideways to him. "I could help with that." She continues before he can voice the protest she sees in his face. "I can create a database about the contents of the books, then eventually we could have them digitized." He states at her open-mouthed. "Don't look so flabbergasted. I'm a lawyer, a big part of what I do is looking through undecipherable text, make sense of it and organized it." She is also tired of sitting on her thumbs while there are things she could do to help him. "Besides I'm at Rosalie's most of the time anyways and it will give me something to do."

"You mean besides taking care of Kelly and the loft? You're not just sitting here doing nothing, you know?"

"I know, but I want to help. I can't exactly go out there chase down Wessen with you, but I can make sure you can find the information you need to catch them and keep yourself alive." His eyes soften and she looks away not ready to deal with what those green eyes make her feel. She clears her throat. "Besides it will be good practice for when I go back to work."

That makes him frown. "Isn't still a little too soon?"

She looks back to their room where Kelly is asleep in his crib. "It's not that I want to go back to work and long hours of reading and dealing with giant egos instead of being with Kelly. I actually kinda like the idea of being a stay at home mom, but I have two kids to put through college and my mother's tax evasion emptied my bank accounts of all my savings." She worries her bottom lip between her teeth and pushes the terrifying thought that she might never get to see Diana again.

Nick sighs, his eyes unreadable. "We'll need to find a daycare then." She is grateful that he doesn't bring up Diana missing status. Given with all their history, he is surprisingly kind to her and she hasn't known much kindness in her life.

"There is one at the office. Kelly won't be more than an elevator trip away from me all day." That's the first thing she checked. She doesn't think she could handle having Kelly farther away than that on a regular basis. Even then, she knows she will be a mess the first time dropping him off.

"Okay."

"To both?"

"Yeah, okay." He turns to look at Kelly too. "Not everybody with Grimm blood becomes a Grimm, you know? He might be a half Zauberbeist or a Grimm, something in between or just a regular kid." Panic threatens to overwhelm her at the thought of a Zauberbeist with a Grimm father, but there is nothing but warmth in his eyes and she relaxes. Nick will never hurt Kelly, no matter what crazy gene combination decides to make itself known. "But regardless, I want him to know about Wessen. I want him to be prepared and to know how to keep himself safe."

"Okay." She stands and pulls him up by their joined hands. "Now come to bed. It's late." She stops dragging him towards their room when what she says hits hers. "I- umm. That sounded differently in my head."

"Oh." He smiles down at her and she can just tell he is trying not to laugh. Insufferable man. She wants to kiss that smirk off his face, but she rolls her eyes instead. They are happening more often, these moments of an almost something between them, and it gets harder and harder to pull back. But if anything does get going with them, she wants it to be about them, not because they have a child together or they are lonely or sharing a bed. Besides Sean, she never cared much what a guy was thinking or feeling when they were with her, but with Nick, it mattered. A lot. And that more than anything scared the crap out of her.