Chapter Eight
Buffy waited impatiently through the rest of the day. Now that she’d decided to tell everyone, she was anxious to get it over with. But she wanted to keep her promise to Spike first. She wasn’t sure exactly how much she was going to tell him, but at a minimum she knew she had to tell him where she came from and why she knew him so well.
She dressed carefully before leaving for patrol that night in a pair of tight leather pants and a low cut blouse. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail and threw a denim jacket over the blouse. She studied her make up critically and added more strawberry flavored gloss before smiling in satisfaction and turning to leave.
She strolled through the cemeteries for over an hour before she felt the tingle that went all the way through her right to her womb. She stopped and sat on a tombstone, waiting for him to make himself known. When she continued to feel him without hearing or seeing him, she huffed impatiently and stood up.
“I thought you wanted to get some answers,” she said loudly. “I have other people to talk to tonight. I can’t wait around here for you to stop playing stalker-guy.”
“I wasn’t stalkin’,” he said coming out of the shadows. “If I was stalkin’ you, you’d have never known I was there.”
She rolled her eyes and said, “I can FEEL you, you big dope. I know when you’re near. You and Angel. I always know when one of you is around. Even if you are hiding.”
“Wasn’t stalkin’” he stubbornly insisted, with a small pout.
“Fine, you weren’t stalking. What were you doing then?”
He mumbled something that she didn’t catch and she walked closer to him, demanding, “What? You were doing what?”
“I was just watchin’ you. Completely different thing, Slayer.”
“Why were you watching me?”
“You’re pretty,” he mumbled again as he took out a cigarette and tried to appear casual. He had no idea why he’d said such a poncy thing, but when he saw the look on her face he was glad he had. She moved even closer to him and looked up at his face.
“You think I’m pretty?” she asked softly.
(Think you’re bleedin’ gorgeous, Slayer. Could get lost in your eyes.)
Aloud, he said, “Well, for a slayer, you are. ‘S not like you lot are known for your good looks, you know. Most slayers are all about the mission and sod all else. At least you dress like a girl.” He ran appreciative eye over her leather covered legs and ass and leered at her.
“Oh,” she moved away from him again, trying to hide the disappointment in her voice.
(I will NOT apologize to the Slayer. I don’t care if her feelin’s are hurt. I’m s’posed to be hurtin’ her. That’s my job. Slayer of Slayers, that’s me.)
Buffy started walking slowly, swinging her stake at her side and the vampire fell into step with her eyeing the stake carefully.
“So, Slayer, you gonna tell me what this...whatever it is...between us is? What the hell is goin’ on and why you know me so well?”
Buffy gestured to a bench and sat down, looking up at him expectantly. When he continued to stand there staring at her she said wryly, “You might want to be sitting down for this, Spike,” patting the bench beside her.
When he still didn’t sit down she flushed and folded her hands under her armpits.
“I’ll keep my hands to myself,” she promised, not looking at him.
Wondering why that promise didn’t make him as happy as he expected it to, he grudgingly sat down at the end away from her and leaned back.
“Well?” he demanded, pulling angrily on his cigarette. “Tell me what’s goin’ on.”
Buffy took a deep breath, and still not looking at him, she began.
“I don’t know exactly what’s going on. All I really know is that I...I’m not the Buffy Summers that has been living in this – time or reality – for the past sixteen years. I’ve been living a different life somewhere else. Somewhere in which a lot of time has passed since I was in high school. I’m... the me that’s inside... 23 years old. I’ve been a Slayer for well over seven years.”
He didn’t respond, just took another drag on his cigarette and waited for her to go on. When she didn’t, he said mildly, “That’s right old for a Slayer, pet. ‘Splains a lot about why I wasn’t able to kill you, I guess. But it doesn’t explain why you know so much about me. It’s not like I’m plannin’ to stay here any longer than it takes me to get Dru well.”
“Well, in my timeline or realty – we really don’t know which it is yet – you don’t have a lot of choice. You can’t leave. And Dru doesn’t want to.”
“And she gets her way because...?” His tone sounded slightly dangerous and she took a peek at him to try to read his face.
“Because I put you in a wheelchair for four months – and Angel loses his soul.”
She tensed and tightened her grip on her stake as he vamped out and snarled.
“Angelus comes back? Who’s responsible for that little bit of insanity?”
The fact that he was more bothered about Angelus’ reappearance than he was about being crippled told all there was to know about the relationship between the two vampires. Spike already hated Angelus before he came back and took Dru away from him.
“Uh, me?”
He flicked his cigarette away and stood up again to glare at her.
“So, you cripple me AND you bring back that miserable bastard? Is there any reason why I shouldn’t kill you right now? Save us both a lot of trouble?”
“You shouldn’t because you can’t.”
“Don’t flatter yourself, bitch,” he snarled, moving closer to her. “You might have managed to make my cock sit up and take notice a couple of times, but there’s been nothing between us to keep me from notchin’ up my third Slayer. I can kill you as easily as I could a complete stranger.”
“No, Spike, you can’t,” she said calmly. The fact that she was so confident and unafraid was the only thing that kept him from leaping on her, teeth bared and claws out. “Not because of what we’ve done in this time, but because of how well I know you. I’ve fought you dozens of times in my life. Probably a lot more than that if you count the times you helped me train by sparring with me. This body isn’t quite as strong as the one I’m used to, but it still responds with all the moves I ask it to make. And my moves, Spike? All new to you. Yours? As familiar to me as the palm of my hand.”
She waited to see how his ego would take her flat statement that she could take him whenever she wanted. She did her best to maintain her calm demeanor, but centered herself and stayed ready just in case he didn’t take it well. But then he surprised her by laughing and letting his human face come back.
“So, the other night, you were jus’ playin’ with me?”
“Well, sorta.” She gave him a shy smile. “But I wouldn’t have been able to do that if you hadn’t—“
“Taught you all you know, huh?” he said with a cocky grin.
Buffy rolled her eyes and huffed, “As IF!” but she smiled as she said it.
“Ok, Slayer,” he said, suddenly growing more serious. “That explains why you’re such a brilliant fighter, but it doesn’t explain why you know so much about my other...talents.”
“Ego, much?” she rolled her eyes again. “I don’t remember saying you had talents.”
“Well, there’s gotta be some reason you can’t keep your hands off my tight little body.” He curled his tongue behind his teeth and leaned toward her. “ I’m guessin’ there’s a good reason why you know things about turnin’ me on that even Dru doesn’t know. An’ I doubt you’ve been readin’ my diary.”
“You have a diary?” Buffy looked suddenly intrigued and he rolled his shoulders in irritation.
“It was just a figure of speech, Slayer.”
He was suddenly right in front of her, his cerulean eyes boring into hers.
“Why do you know those things about me, Slayer? Why can my mortal enemy make me hard just by being close enough for me to smell her?”
When Buffy leaned in toward him unconsciously, he added as he bent toward the warm lips just below his mouth, “And why does she want to do those things to one of the evil things she was born to kill? Why, Slayer? Why do you want me?”
Their lips met and once again, the world disappeared for both of them as they lost themselves in the taste and feel of each other. Buffy felt his arms tentatively go around her waist and she melted against him allowing him to support her body as she clung to his neck. She felt his desire for her pressing into her stomach and she moaned slightly when he pulled her even closer.
“Bloody hell, luv. Want you so bad...what are you doin’ to me?” he groaned into her ear as he moved his mouth down her neck, leaving wet kisses as he did. When he ran his tongue lightly across her collarbone before dipping down to kiss along the tops of her breasts, she gasped and threw her head back baring her neck.
Without thinking, he fastened his blunt teeth on her exposed throat and sucked on the pounding pulse there. He fought down the urge to bring his demon out and sink his fangs into the tender skin he had pulled into his mouth. Suddenly he felt her stiffen and he froze wondering if he was going to get her stake though his back, but she pulled away from him with a whimper and whirled to face an approaching group of vamps.
Cursing himself for not hearing the approach of his minions and letting them catch him with the Slayer, he snarled and stepped in front of her. With an indignant snort, she shoved him out of the way and fell into a fighting stance.
The minions stopped their advance, confused that their master, who had appeared to be biting the girl, was now standing beside a very much alive Slayer and snarling at them.
“What d’you gits want?” he growled.
“We...Drusilla is calling for you and we came to find...why isn’t she dead?” The tall, skinny vamp who spoke pointed toward Buffy. “Do you need help?”
While Buffy tried to hide her giggle, Spike roared at them, “No, I don’t need any fuckin’ help! Get the hell out of here, you morons. Go back and take care of Dru.”
“She wants you to come back now,” the minion repeated stubbornly. “She said to bring you back with us.”
“I really don’t think you want to try to do that, mate,” Spike growled coldly.
“Maybe we do.” The vamp who spoke next was a large, muscular minion who had expected to take over as master until Spike arrived. He moved slowly toward the older vampire, gesturing at the others to surround Spike and Buffy.
“What d’you say, pet? Fancy a spot of violence before we finish our talk?”
“It’s what we do best,” Buffy answered cheerily, twirling her stake.
“Right then.” Without any further discussion, they sprang into action, punching and kicking their way out of the surrounding vamps and turning to dust two of them before they could react. While Buffy wielded her stake to great effect, with a minimal amount of wasted energy, Spike was reveling in the fight itself. He took out all the pent up frustration Buffy was creating in him on the faces and bodies of the vamps in front of him.
When Buffy had dusted all but the one Spike was still fighting, she sat back down on the bench to watch him gradually destroy the large vamp that had challenged him. The blond vampire dropped back into his human features as though to taunt his opponent with how easily he was winning their fight. With a final kick to the bigger vamp’s head, he held out his hand and Buffy tossed him her stake, which he drove through the chest in front of him.
As the dust settled around them, he walked back over to the Slayer and with no hesitation he handed her the stake and sat back down.
“We fight well together,” he remarked, pulling out another cigarette.
“Always have,” she agreed.
Neither one mentioned what they were doing when the vampires appeared and they sat in uncomfortable silence for several minutes. Spike broke the silence eventually by asking quietly, “So, pet, you gonna answer my question?”
“There was a question?”
He tilted his head and smiled at her.
“You dodgin’ it, pet? Or just hopin’ I’ll be so gobsmacked by the kissin’ I’ll forget what we were talkin’ about?”
“Little bit of both, probably,” she admitted honestly. “Is it working?”
He sighed and let his head loll against the back of the bench.
“No, luv, it’s not workin’. My question still stands. What are we to each other in your world?”
“It’s...it’s complicated.”
“Oh no you don’t, Slayer. Don’t give me that ‘complicated’ shit again.”
He turned to look at her and found she was looking at him with damp eyes. He felt his stomach clench at what he saw there.
“Don’t,” he said flatly.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should go. I have to tell my friends and...and Angel.”
She stood up and turned away to leave without answering his question. She was fairly certain that as perceptive as Spike could be, he would figure it out. She had already taken several steps when his voice stopped her.
“I love Dru.”
“I know you do,” she said softly.
“Did I love her in your world?”
“For a while longer, you did,” she answered him honestly.
“I’d never stop lovin’ her. Not for you, not for anybody. She’s my savior, my reason for existence...I don’t believe you. I don’t leave the people I love.”
Buffy came back to stand in front of where he had remained seated on the bench.
“I know you don’t,” she said softly, looking into his eyes earnestly. “It’s one the things I lo- like most about you.”
“I’m not the Spike you know, Slayer. I don’t love you.”
“You want me,” she replied, eyeing the still visible bulge in his jeans.
“Can’t deny it. I do. But doesn’t mean anything. Doesn’t mean I love you.”
“It’s a start.” She stroked the side of his face gently and gave him a sad smile, repeating, “It’s a start.”
When he reached for her to pull her onto his lap, she backed away reluctantly, shaking her head.
“I really do need to get back to the school. I’m sure they’re all waiting for me and Giles is getting impatient.”
“This when you let all your little buddies in on things?”
“Uh huh. I’m at least going to tell them about the real me. I haven’t decided how much to say about what I know is going to happen, ‘cause if I can stop it, then they never need to know...”
“You gonna tell the great poof about losin’ his soul?” He tried to sound casual, but she could hear the worry in his voice.
“Probably. He needs to know that it could happen. And...and how to avoid it.” She looked away from his perceptive eyes and flushed.
“Believe you said it was your fault, pet. Want to let a curious vamp in on the secret?”
“No,” she said flatly. “All you need to know is that it isn’t going to happen this time. For more than one reason,” she added quietly.
He stood up fluidly, invading her space as he did so. He dipped his head and brushed his lips over hers, enjoying the warmth of their soft touch. He pushed the disloyal comparison to Dru’s cold mouth away, even as he allowed her to move her lips around on his. She gently touched his lower lip with her tongue, then pulled it into her mouth and sucked on it gently before releasing it and running her tongue over his sensitive teeth and gums.
He shivered at her touch, marveling again at how this woman knew just where and how to touch him. He deepened the kiss, pulling her against his body and reveling in the warmth pressing against him. When Buffy reluctantly broke off the kiss and pushed gently against his chest, he released his hold on her, but maintained contact with her mouth as long as he could.
He pressed his forehead to hers and with his eyes shut said, “I’d know you weren’t sixteen just from the way you kiss, luv. Whoever taught you sure as hell knew what he was doin’”
She lifted her head and looked at him with her eyebrows raised in amusement.
It took a couple of seconds and then he laughed softly and shrugged. “Oh. Well. Good on me, then.”
Buffy laughed softly in agreement and moved away from him.
“I really do have to go, Spike.”
“Alright, pet. Aside from gettin’ put in a wheel chair, anythin’ else I need to know about my life for next few months?”
She looked at him steadily, then shrugged and said quickly, “Forget the Order of Taraka. Forget about the Judge – he’s not quite as weapon-proof as he’d like to think. And...and Dru wouldn’t be quite as unhappy as you would if Angelus came back.”
She saw his face darken and realized he knew exactly what she meant by that.
“Guess we’ll just have to make sure the wanker stays gone, then, won’t we, pet?” he replied tightly.
“Be my first choice,” she said softly. “Even if it does mean you...”
“Even if it means I what?”
“Nothing.”
He looked at her with curiosity, but didn’t pursue it.
“Guess you’d better get to your meetin’, then, Slayer. Let your little friends know you’re not a bloody teenager anymore.”
“Good night, Spike,” she said turning away.
“Take care, Slayer,” he answered softly as he watched her walk away, golden hair bouncing in the light from the street lamps.
Chapter Nine
Buffy walked into the library to find Giles tapping his pen impatiently and her friends looking up expectantly. She paused just inside the door when she felt a tingle, then relaxed when she saw Angel move away from the wall he’d been standing next to.
“Hi, guys. I’m sorry I’m late. Made a quick patrol first and it got a little complicated.”
“What happened?”
“Are you all right?”
“Why didn’t you ask me to go with you?” This last came from Angel and she could hear the hurt and anger in his voice.
“Or me,” Kendra added indignantly from the opposite side of the room. “You told me you weren’t going patrolling tonight.”
“I’m fine. It wasn’t a big deal, and now Spike has a few less minions for us to worry about.”
“William the Bloody has minions? How do you know they were his?” Giles’ sharp tone got her attention and she turned to see that her watcher was looking at her with more suspicion than her report warranted. She sighed mentally and resigned herself to the fact that she was going to have to tell Giles more than she wanted to about Spike and the future.
“Yes, he has minions. But not as many as he did before. He took over the Master’s. Now can we get on with this?” Her tone was somewhat sharper than she meant it to be, but the look on her watcher’s face was reminding her too much of his attempt to kill Spike while she was fighting the First.
“Very well,” Giles said, somewhat taken back by her tone. He still hadn’t become accustomed to the idea that he was dealing with a fully adult slayer with years of experience and it grated on him when she spoke to him as an equal.
“So, Buffster, what’s the what?” Xanders cheery and oblivious question broke the tension and Buffy walked to the center of the room and leaned against the table.
“Okay, I know this is going to sound...weird...even for the Hellmouth. But,” she took a deep breath, “I’m not the Buffy you guys know. I mean, I am that Buffy, but I’m her 7 years from now. Wil-somebody did a spell and put me back here into my sixteen year old body, but with all my memories intact.”
She waited to see if anyone wanted to say anything, but Xander and Willow were just staring at her with their mouths agape. Kendra was wearing her serious face and Angel was staring at her through narrowed eyes.
“I – we waited to tell you because we don’t know if I’ve been sent back to my past, or to an alternate dimension from mine. At first I was worried about doing anything to change what I know is going to happen, because there’s no way to know what effect that would have on my world. But then I decided that if I can prevent some of the horrible things that I know are going to happen to...to people I care about, then I need to do it. There is absolutely no way I can stand by and watch things...things that I know how to stop.
“So, I’m telling you all about me so that when I say or do something you think is weird or wrong, you’ll know I have a reason.”
She turned and smiled at her two best friends.
“I still love you guys as much as ever, but I’ve got to tell you, pretending to care about the things I cared about when I was sixteen is getting to be...let’s just say I’ll be taking frequent breaks from being my teenage self. Please don’t take it personally, or think I don’t love you.”
“So,” Willow ventured, “we’re all still friends in your time? We stuck together?”
Buffy hesitated just long enough for Willow to begin a small frown, then said honestly, “We’ve had our ups and downs, but, yeah, we’re still all good friends. Friends who have been through a lot together.”
The red headed girl and dark haired boy visible relaxed back into their chairs.
“Well that’s good then. Nice to know none of us get eaten or otherwise made dead.”
Only Giles noticed Buffy’s slight flinch and he frowned again, adding that to his mental notes of things to quiz her about.
“And what about me?” Angel’s quiet voice came from the edge of the group. “Am I still around in your time?”
Buffy met his eyes and cringed a little at the pain she knew she was going to cause him.
“In the still undead sense? Yes. You are very much around. Just not around Sunnydale...of course, nobody’s actually around Sun--never mind .”
She smiled at him and said sadly, “Things don’t...didn’t work out between us and you left me. Left Sunnydale. Went to LA and started a detective agency. Now you’re the CEO of a big, formerly evil, law firm.”
“That’s in your time. If things can be changed, then that doesn’t need to happen. I could stay here, with you.”
“No, Angel,” she said softly, with as much compassion as she could put into her voice, “you really can’t.”
She held his eyes long enough to let him see the affection she still had for him, and to see the complete lack of anything else he was used to seeing from her.
“Are you going to tell me why?” he asked somewhat angrily. “I think I have a right to know.”
“Yeah, Buff, are you going to tell us so we’re all ‘see-the-future’ people? Can you tell us what next week’s winning lottery numbers are?”
Buffy laughed lightly at Xander’s eagerness and started to answer him when she felt a familiar thrill go down her spine and she glanced around quickly. When she didn’t see any sign of the other vampire in her life, she continued as though she had no idea he might be listening.
“I think the safest thing to do, guys, is for me to tell you what I know you SHOULDN’T do, and if it’s necessary, I’ll tell you why. Actually, at this time, the only person who needs to not do something she did in my time is me.” She gave everyone an apologetic smile and added, “And I am definitely NOT telling you what that was. Just know that I won’t be doing it this time around.”
“Can you tell me if I get better at magic? Can you tell me that, Buffy?” Willow’s open and eager face waited eagerly for what Buffy had to say. The Slayer moved closer to her friend and patted her hand gently.
“You are capable of becoming a very powerful witch, Will. But I want you to promise me that you will let Giles guide you and be very careful about the spells you try. Will you do that for me?”
Her friend looked at her in bewilderment and said with disappointment, “Of course I will, Buffy. I would never do any spells that could hurt anyone.” She paused and looked at Buffy’s unsmiling face. “Would I? Oh my god, I would! I did, didn’t I? Oh, I’m so sorry! What did I do? I didn’t mean to...I—“
Buffy quickly stopped her friend’s apologetic babbling with a comforting hug.
“It’s all right, Will. You haven’t done anything wrong in this time. And, believe me, you helped to save the world with your magic more than once in mine.
“I did?” she perked up immediately. “What did I do? Who did I help? Did I help you?”
Buffy laughed at the red head’s eagerness and said reassuringly, “I’ll tell you what you did one of these days. But not just yet.”
“Any chance I was part of this world-savege, Buffy?”
Xander looked hopeful, but not at all sure of the answer, as he waited to hear about his future self.
“Oh, Xan, you know I wouldn’t be able to face...the things I have to face, without all my friends supporting me. Of course you were part of it. And, actually, you saved the world all by yourself, one time.”
The dark-eyed boy beamed and sent a triumphant sneer at Angel before settling back in his chair. When Buffy saw the look, she approached him and said carefully, “But there is one thing I’d like you to think about.”
He looked at her quizzically and waited.
“Try not to be so judgmental about...people. And, give me a little credit for making good choices, huh?”
“I take it we’re talking about people of the male persuasion,” he asked with a wry smile. “Men I didn’t think were good enough for my Buffster?”
“Yeah, kinda like that,” she agreed with a smile.
(No sense telling him I was referring to another vampire, just yet.)
The boy shot Angel an apologetic look and slouched down in his chair.
“What about me, Buffy?” Angel inquired as he stalked closer to her. “Where do I fit into all this world saving that you seem to have done. Do I get to help you defeat the evil that would try to destroy it? Or do you stop letting me help you when you stop lo—“
(Guess this isn’t a good time to tell him he IS one of the would-be world enders.)
“I thought we’d talk...privately...about that, Angel. I do have something to tell you. Something very important, but not right now.”
Once again the old vampire was circling her and sniffing.
“Why do I smell him on you again?” he growled. “What the hell is going on. If you need help killing him—“
She didn’t even try to pretend she didn’t know who he was talking about.
“There will be no killing of Spike,” Buffy said quietly and saw Angel’s eyes flash amber while everyone else in the room gaped at her.
“And why would that be, Buffy?” came her watcher’s calm voice as he asked what everyone was thinking.
Buffy sighed, not having planned to tell anyone about Spike until she’d decided what to tell him about his future. However, with everyone staring at her expectantly and with the blond vamp hiding behind her in the stacks listening, she mentally shrugged and decided to tell everyone at once and deal with the fall out.
“No one touches Spike, because in my time, he helps me save the world a couple of times – and the final time he...” she had to stop as a lump unexpectedly appeared in her throat, “he sacrifices himself to do it.”
Louder than any of the comments from the shocked humans in the room, or the roar from the unbelieving vampire, was the sound of books falling, a body hitting the floor, and a furious, “No bloody, fuckin’ way!”
Buffy moved to the entrance to the corridor from which the noise was emanating and looked in amusement at the sight of Spike sprawled on the floor, fuming and covered with the books he’d knocked down when he punched the shelves.
He glared at her furiously and growled, “You just said that because you knew I was listenin’, didn’t you? Ha, bloody ha, Slayer. It was a riot.”
She walked in and knelt down in front of him, gently removing the books covering his legs. He shook the rest of them off and sat up, putting his face that much closer to hers.
“Tell me you were kiddin’, pet. Please tell me you were kiddin’,” he begged pitifully.
“Sorry, Big Bad. I didn’t mean to let it out quite like that, but I can’t have anybody trying to stake you when I’m not around. Just in case we need some world saving again...”
He stood up and shook himself, settling his leather coat around his body and trying to regain some dignity. Buffy cocked her head at him and said softly, “Since you’re here, you might as well meet the gang. But don’t expect them to like you right aw-“
“Don’t WANT them to like me,” he grumbled, obediently following her out of the stacks and into the frightened and hostile faces waiting for them.
Xander and Willow drew together and tried to hide behind Giles who was holding a large cross and frowning at the close proximity between his Slayer and the vampire renowned for killing her kind.
Kendra’s face was a study in confusion. Clearly the blond man behind Buffy was a powerful vampire, and just as clearly, the other slayer was unafraid to turn her back on him.
While everyone stared at the notorious vampire standing right behind Buffy, his eyes were fixed on only one set of amber orbs glaring at him.
“Angelus,” he snarled.
“Spike,” the other vampire hissed.
The tension in the room was palpable as the two master vampires faced each other. Buffy remained in front of Spike, the hard look on her face making it very clear that she was serious about his not being harmed by anyone.
“Buffy,” Angel growled, “I don’t know what he’s told you, but you can’t trust him. He has no soul. And you heard his reaction when you said he saved the world for you. He’s pure evil, and should be put down like a mad dog.”
“You plannin’ to take over Dru’s care, then, are you?” Spike asked mildly. “Cause she needs even more care right now than she has in the past.”
Oblivious to the humans in the room, Angel stalked toward his grandchilde.
“Why did you come here? Why bring her here?”
“Thought the Hellmouth would help her heal, but it’s not workin’. She needs more.”
His eyes bored into the furious older vampire’s, daring him to pretend he didn’t know what his childe needed to recover.
“If you’ll leave after, I’ll do it,” Angel said, never taking his eyes from Spike’s. “But if you don’t leave, I’ll kill both of you.”
Buffy stepped forward and put a hand on Angel’s chest as she turned toward the surprised blond vampire.
“Spike, I told you I wouldn’t let you do that ritual. I’m not going to let you kill Angel any more than I’m going to let him kill you.”
Still meeting the other vampire’s eyes, Spike answered her coldly, “Not your decision to make, pet. But he’s not takin’ about a ritual. He’s talkin’ about volunteerin’. Isn’t that right, Peaches?”
The humans in the room all looked confused for a moment, until the watcher said with dawning recognition, “Sire’s blood. She needs sire’s blood to recover her strength.”
Buffy looked rapidly back forth between the two staring vampires. It was obvious that they had reached an agreement when Spike dropped his eyes and turned away with a shrug.
“Alright, then. You give her what she needs, and I’ll take her away and never come back.”
He ignored the way Buffy’s mouth tightened when he said he wouldn’t be back.
(No way am I letting this chit of a Slayer interfere with restoring my dark princess. She can make all the sad eyes she wants at me. I’m gonna take my Dru and leave and never give her another thought. Don’t care how good a kisser she is, or how good her blood tastes. When Dru recovers, I’m outa here. For good.)
“Sounds like a plan!” Xander said into the heavy silence. “Deadboy does a little donating and the evil twosome leave town, never to be seen again. I like it.”
“I don’t like it,” came from the normally quiet dark slayer. “For what reason would we allow a powerful vampiress to recover her strength when she could be easily slain now?”
She whirled on Buffy and said angrily, “If you won’t do the job for which you were chosen and rid the world of these two, I will do it for you.”
“Kendra,” Buffy tried to speak in a conciliatory manner. “You don’t want to go up against Dru. Please believe me. And I won’t let you stake Spike. I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”
“I don’t understand a Slayer that protects vampires,” the other girl shook her head. “An’ you’re protecting two of them. You should be ashamed.”
Before Buffy could continue the argument, the other Slayer whirled and left the library, muttering to herself about traitors and sharpened stakes. Buffy sighed and added finding Kendra before she found Dru to her list of things to do.
“Let’s do it,” Angel said to Spike, picking his jacket up off a chair. He and Spike moved toward the door, stopping when Buffy ran after them and grabbed his arm.
“Wait! You’re just going to go with him like that? I thought you told me he couldn’t be trusted?”
“He wouldn’t do anything to harm Drusilla. I’ll be fine, Buffy.” His eyes were warm as he basked in the obvious worry she felt for him. He told himself that just because she was older, it didn’t mean she couldn’t fall back in love with him. She hadn’t indicated that she had anyone in her life at the time she was sent back.
“I’m going with you,” she said stubbornly. “I don’t trust any of you not to mess this up.”
“Buffy,” Angel tried to reason with her. “It’s a very simple thing I’ll be doing, but not one you probably want to watch. It’s a vampire sire/childe...issue.”
“Let her come, Peaches. It’s high time the chit learned a thing or two about you and yours.”
“Shut up, Spike,” he snarled. “I don’t want her watching. She’s only sixteen...” his voice trailed off as he remembered what he’d just learned about this Buffy’s true age.
“She’s a big girl now,” the cocky blond said with a sideways look at the blushing Slayer. “She’ll be alright.”
“I want to go on record as saying this is a really, really bad idea,” the bigger vamp said, giving in and heading for the door.
“Duly noted,” Spike replied with a wink at Buffy. He gestured for her to precede him through the door and her watcher and friends stared in shock as she strode out between two master vampires looking for all the world like it happened every day.
Chapter Ten
As they approached the warehouse where Drusilla and the few minions left were waiting, Spike touched Buffy’s arm gently and she dropped back beside him.
“Don’t get too close to Dru, pet,” he said softly. “ Especially after she’s recovered.”
Buffy looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “You don’t think I can take Dru? I’m not Kendra.” She flushed when his eyes glittered and she realized she’d given away that in her time the other Slayer met her fate at his consort’s hands.
“I don’t want to find out which of you would win that kind of confrontation,” he said tightly. “An’ if she smells me all over you, there’s gonna be a confrontation, believe me.”
“Which one of us are you worried about, Spike? I mean, I’m just another Slayer, according to you. Why should you care if your “dark princess” kills me?”
The vampire ground his teeth and stretched his neck, trying to control his temper.
“I shouldn’t.” he said curtly. “But until I figure out why I do, no vampire touches you except me.”
“Slayer, here, Spike. Vampires touch me all the time. Or try to anyway.”
“You know what I mean. Are you TRYING to piss me off?”
She sighed and dropped her head.
“No, not really. I’ll stay away if I can. But, Spike?”
“Yeah?”
“She’s gonna know. She doesn’t need to smell us. She knows before we do.”
He nodded his head and sighed, “You’re probably right about that, pet. Bloody Miss Edith will tell her if nothin’ else.”
“Miss Edith?”
But the blond vamp just shook his head and walked faster to catch up with Angel. Buffy hurried after them and arrived at the door just in time to hear Drusilla scream.
“Daddy! My daddy is back! Look, Spike, Daddy is back and we can be a family again.”
The pale brunette vampire moved toward Angel as quickly as she could, a smile on her face. Then, she got close enough to really see him and she recoiled, hissing, “Not Daddy. Bad Spike to bring me this...thing.”
“Calm down, Dru,” Angel said soothingly. “It’s me. I’ve come to help you get well. Then you and Spike can go away to someplace nice.”
“Oooh, someplace with lots of lovely little children for me and pretty girls for my sweet William?”
Buffy cringed and fought back the urge to hurl her stake through the lunatic’s chest. As badly as she wanted Dru gone, and as much as her Slayer instincts were demanding that she remove this deadly predator, she knew Spike would never forgive her if she did.
Angel had approached the now twirling woman and was attempting to get her to stop dancing around long enough to see what he was offering. When he used his own fangs to rip open his wrist and held it in front of her nose, she stopped abruptly and immediately went into vamp face.
“For me?” she breathed as she took his wrist in her hand. “Is it for me, Daddy”
“Yes, Dru, it’s for you. Just enough to help you get strong again. So you can leave here.”
She put his wrist to her mouth and began to suck on it, shutting her eyes in ecstasy as she did so. As she pulled on his blood, Buffy was shocked to see a bulge grow in Angel’s pants and she gasped as he pulled the vampire to his body and fastened his fangs on her neck. Without releasing her hold on his wrist, Drusilla wrapped on leg around the other vampire and pressed her pelvis to his, moaning his name.
Beside her, Buffy felt Spike tense up and she glanced at him to see if she was going to need to restrain him from killing Angel. To her surprise, even though his fists were clenched tightly at his sides and she wasn’t sure she didn’t see tears in his eyes, he maintained his control and just continued to watch the woman he loved while she crawled all over her sire.
When she saw Drusilla unzip Angel’s pants and pull his cock out to slip under her dress, Buffy blushed like the sixteen year old whose body she was wearing and she tried to turn away. But Spike grabbed her arms and pulled her in close to his chest as he forced her to watch. She could feel his erection pressing into her ass and she unconsciously pushed back against him, eliciting a groan.
“Watch Slayer,” he whispered into her ear, his cool breath sending shivers down her spine. “Watch and learn what a vampire really is.”
“I don’t want to watch this, Spike,” she hissed at him. “And I can’t believe you want to watch it either. Let me go.”
“You really want me to let you go, luv? Are you sure about that?” he asked, rubbing himself against her warm body. “I thought you wanted me?”
“Not like this, I don’t. Let me go!” she struggled against the steel bands of his arms and to her dismay, she felt tears start in her eyes.
The instant he smelled her tears, he loosened his arms and to her amazement, he buried his face in her neck, murmuring how sorry he was and asking her to forgive him. She pushed him away and turned around to face him, only to find that he wouldn’t meet her eyes.
“What the hell was that!” she snarled.
“That was the evil one being a vampire,” said a cold voice behind them.
They both whirled to find Kendra standing in the entrance to the room, holding her stake in one hand and a sword in the other. Buffy unconsciously moved between Spike and the other slayer, ignoring his angry growl and putting out her arm to prevent him from getting in front of her.
“Kendra, you need to leave here. Please, listen to me. Just leave. They’ll be done soon and then Spike and Drusilla will leave and you can go back to...wherever...and worry about your local vamps.”
Instead of answering her, the other Slayer flew across the room and whirled her sword at Drusilla’s head. A large, meaty hand came up at the last second and grabbed her wrist, wrenching it so the sword fell to the floor. The female vampire turned languidly and without moving at all, she gestured to her eyes and said in a sultry voice, “be in me”. Kendra froze in place and before Buffy could say anything, the vampire’s talon-like fingernails had sliced the other slayer’s throat.
Buffy moaned and started toward the group, only to be stopped by Spike’s hand on her arm.
“Don’t, pet. Somethin’s not...”
Buffy looked at the tall vampire now leering at her and felt her blood run cold. She knew that face and those eyes. She still saw them in her nightmares every now and then.
“Angelus,” she breathed.
“Hello, lover,” he answered, licking his bloody lips.
“You need to leave, luv,” Spike whispered into her ear. “You can’t fight both of them.”
“Get her out of my town, Spike,” she responded as she whirled and flew out the door. She ran until her lungs were screaming for air, then sat down on the curb and sobbed into her hands.
Chapter Eleven
The Slayer allowed herself a few minutes of mourning for her sister slayer and for her inability to prevent Angel from losing his soul, then stood up and with a determined look on her face she raced to her watcher’s apartment. She banged on the door until the disheveled-looking man let her in, then immediately went to the phone and began dialing Willow’s number.
As soon as her sleepy friend answered, she began giving her instructions, which she then had to repeat as Willow came awake and realized who was talking to her so rapidly.
“B-Buffy? What are you saying? Angel doesn’t have his soul anymore? What do you want me to do?”
“The first thing you need to do is a dis-invite spell for your house. Right away. I don’t know how long it will be before he starts trying to—Just do it, Will. Now.”
Buffy paused for breath. From the corner of her eye, she could see the blood drain from Giles’ face has he processed what Buffy was telling her friend. To her surprise, an equally upset Jenny Calendar appeared behind him, wearing Gile’s bathrobe and clutching it around her slender body.
“What’s the next thing, Buffy?” came Willow’s voice over the phone.
“We’re going to need someone to do a spell to restore his soul. Someone who can recreate the curse...” She kept her eyes on the self-styled techno-pagan and was gratified to see awareness and then nodding acceptance in the warm brown eyes.
Buffy nodded back and asked Willow to go to her house as soon as it was daylight and do a dis-invite spell there also. She could see that Giles was already looking in a book for the proper words to work on for his apartment.
Jenny immediately went into the bedroom and began throwing on her clothes. She needed to get back to the school and into the computer lab immediately if she was going to locate anyone who might know where to find the curse spell.
Buffy next called Xander to warn him not to let Angel in, should the vampire show up at his door. She could almost feel the self-satisfied smirk on her friend’s face when she told him Angel had become dangerous, and she had to fight the urge to run over there and smack it off. Fortunately for him, the boy had enough sense to keep his “I told you so” to himself and Buffy hung up after warning him to be careful.
While Giles worked his dis-invite spell, Jenny came out of the bedroom and walked over to Buffy.
“How did this happen? I thought you were going to be sure that he didn’t have that moment of happiness?”
“Apparently, I’m not the only thing that makes him happy,” she replied, rolling her eyes.
Jenny just blinked, then nodded her head and began to put her jacket on.
“Where are you going?”
“To the school, to begin searching for the curse.”
“Not now you’re not,” the Slayer said fiercely. “Not until daylight. You don’t go anywhere at night without me.”
“Why is that, Buffy?” came her Watcher’s cold voice. “Is there something else we should know that you haven’t told us?”
Buffy sank down onto the sofa and put her head in her hands. Suddenly the slayer was gone and there was a young woman who had seen too much death and pain fighting to hold back tears.
“I’m getting scared, Giles. I couldn’t save Angel’s soul; I couldn’t save Kendra. What if everything is going to happen all over again, no matter what I do to change it?”
“Then we will deal with it when the time comes,” he said soothingly. “But you need to tell us what we have to worry about if we are going to be of any help to you.”
The gypsy woman looked at Buffy with haunted eyes and asked, “Can we start with why I can’t go out at night without a bodyguard?”
Buffy met her eyes and said flatly, “Because Angelus will find you and kill you before you can give us the spell we need.” She turned her eyes to her Watcher’s stunned face. “And you really do not want me to tell you how he uses her death to torment you. One of the things I know about Angelus is that he loves to toy with his victims before he kills them. He is a master at mental torture. It’s why Drusilla is the lunatic she is. He made her mad before he turned her.”
“How do you know this, Buffy? Surely Angel didn’t tell you?”
“Actually, he kind of did tell me about Dru, although he left out a lot of details. When...when he has his soul, he’s ashamed of it. It was Spike who told me more about what Angelus was like before he lost his soul.”
“Which brings us to the next question. How does William the Bloody fit into this? Where and how did you become so familiar with the killer of slayers that you trust him as much as you obviously do?”
Buffy sighed and leaned her head against the back of the couch, closing her eyes.
“I really had hoped to put this off for awhile, but I guess you have a right to know. When Angel loses – lost his soul, in my time, Spike was in a wheel chair healing from a broken back.” When her watcher raised his eyebrows questioningly, she nodded shortly, verifying her part in that, and then went back to her story. “He spent months being tormented by Angelus; watching him ...well, watching Angelus and Dru together; having to depend on a sadist and a lunatic for everything, including food.
“When the two loony tunes decided to end the world by restoring Acathla, he came to me for a truce. Turns out Spike likes the world the way it is. He offered to help me stop them, if I would let him take Dru away somewhere far from here. They, Angelus and Dru, didn’t know he could walk again, so he was able to take Angel by surprise and give me time to get in and attack him.”
“And what happened? I presume you were able to stop Acathla?”
“I was too late. Angelus had opened the portal and the only way I could stop it was to stab him and send him through it.”
“I’m sorry, Buffy, that must have been difficult for you.”
“You have no idea,” she said. “It made me run away to LA and quit slaying for months.” She stopped and looked at her clearly concerned Watcher. “That was the sixteen year old me, Giles. The one that thought Angel was the love of her life, her soul mate. I’m not that naive little girl anymore. If I get a chance to kill him now, I’ll take it. That’s why I’m hoping that Willow and Jenny will come up with the spell to re-soul him before I have to kill him again.”
“And this trust of Spike stems from that one incident in which he helped you in order to save his girl friend from Angelus?” Giles was wearing the face she had seen way too many times in her lifetime and she answered with what could only be called a snarl.
“No, it stems from years of his helping me, caring for my sis-family, protecting my friends when I couldn’t be here to do it, and loving me unconditionally no matter how I treated him. Not to mention, the whole going-up in-flames-to-save-the-world thing.”
Giles flinched back from the very strong and obviously angry girl.
“I’m sorry, Buffy. I just find it very difficult to believe that William the Bloody could turn into someone to be trusted. Not without being cursed with a soul, like Angel was. What would possess him to do such a thing?”
“Did you miss the ‘loving me unconditionally’ part of my little tirade?” she asked with a sad smile. “He did it for me. Because he loves – loved me.”
“He loved you? Without a soul? Extraordinary! I should like to speak with him about this –“ He broke off, remembering that the Spike she was referring to was dead.
“But, Buffy,” he said gently, “this is not your Spike. This one is still in love with Drusilla.”
“So he keeps reminding me,” she said wryly.
Giles blinked in surprise.
“You’ve talked about this? He knows?”
“I haven’t told him very much. But he knows there is – was – will be something between us. He just hasn’t realized it yet.”
“And, yet, still you trust him?”
“Yes, I do. And that is the last time I will have that trust questioned. By you, or Xander, or Angel, or anyone else.”
Her expression was pure Slayer and clearly indicated the conversation was over as far as she was concerned.
When no one was able to break the silence that followed her ultimatum, she stood up and headed for the door.
“I have to get home to warn my mom. Angel has a free pass to my house that she doesn’t even know about.”
“Be careful, Buffy.”
“I’ll be fine,” she said with no inflection. “If he’s counting on my feelings to protect him this time...” She didn’t finish her sentence, just shrugged and went out into the night.
When she got to Revello Drive, she was surprised to see a light on in the kitchen and her heart rate sped up as she hurried up the walk. Fearing what she would find, she rushed into the kitchen, only to find Spike sitting quietly with her mother and sipping on a cup of hot chocolate.
“You let him in?” she practically shrieked at her mother. “You know what he is, and you let him in?”
Her mother looked embarrassed and said haltingly, “I...he seemed so worried. And you weren’t home yet. And he was so sad...and, yes,” her chin came up as she remembered that his was her teenage daughter lecturing her. “I let him in. It’s my house and I’ll invite in whom I please.”
Buffy just sighed and rolled her eyes. Then she whirled on the vampire.
“What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be trying to get your ho-bag of a girl friend out of here like I told you to?”
His eyes flashed amber for a second, and Buffy unconsciously reached for the stake in her waistband. They glared at each other for a minute, then the vampire’s shoulders slumped and he said quietly, “You were right, pet. She won’t leave her precious ‘daddy’. Couldn’t stand to watch them anymore, so I came to find you.”
“I’m not quite sure how to take that,” she said, relaxing a little.
“Can’t say I’m sure how I meant it,” he gave her a small smile and she smiled back and pushed the stake back down.
“But I wasn’t here. Why did you come in?”
“Thought you wouldn’t want your mum all alone here without you to protect her. I figured the great poof prob’ly has an invite, yeah?”
“Yeah, he does.”
“Buffy,” her mother said in her best what-the-hell-is-going-on-here voice.
Ignoring her for a minute, Buffy stepped closer to Spike and said softly, “So, you stayed here to protect my mother, huh?”
“Well, that, and she makes great hot chocolate.” He beamed at Joyce, than turned to Buffy to growl, “Tell anybody and I’ll kill you.”
Buffy heard her mother gasp at that remark, but she was too busy laughing at him to reassure the older woman. When Joyce saw that Buffy wasn’t afraid of the vampire, she sat back down and sipped at her own cup.
“So,” she said conversationally, “are you two going to tell me what’s going on? And who is the ‘great poof’?”
“Un, that would be your daughter’s ex boy friend,” Spike volunteered even as Buffy was frantically trying to signal him with her eyes.
“Boy friend? Ex boy friend? My sixteen year old daughter has had a boy friend long enough for him to be a ex, and I haven’t met him?” Her mother’s tone was cool and disappointed.
“Sixteen?” he turned wide eyes on Buffy. “You haven’t told her yet? Your own mother?”
“Told me what? Buffy what is going on around here?”
With a fierce glare at the grinning vampire, Buffy attempted to tell her mother about her true situation, but she could see that it was asking a lot to expect a woman who had just found out about her daughter’s calling and vampires and demons, to make a leap of faith and believe in time travel and alternate dimensions.
“You—you’re not sixteen?” her mother asked with a bewildered look between her daughter and the vampire who was nodding enthusiastically.
“My body is. But the person inside it? Not so much, Mom. I’ve been around for another 6 or 7 years. Very rough years, I might add. So if I seem...”
“Bossy? Cranky? Full of myself?”
“Shut up, Spike,” She spoke without thinking, then suddenly the familiarity of that phrase made her stomach clench and she grasped the kitchen counter with white knuckles as she fought off tears.
Joyce watched in bewilderment as the vampire immediately stopped grinning and flowed from his seat to her daughter’s side and held her gently while she blinked back tears.
“‘M sorry, pet. Used to say that to me a lot, did you?”
She leaned toward him, nodding her head gently and resting her forehead against his chest just so she could inhale his scent for a short period of time. She finally stood up straight and pulled back, looking up at him apologetically.
“Sorry, I just really miss you...him...sometimes and it’s hard to be around you and not...”
“I’m sorry I can’t be him for you, pet. I wish I could be. But I’m not. You can push my buttons all you want, but it’s not gonna change that.”
She nodded and moved away from him, only to see her mother looking back and forth between them with a puzzled frown.
“Am I missing something here?” her mother inquired.
“I’ll explain it later, mom,” Buffy said tiredly. “Why don’t you go back to bed. I’ll stay up until Willow gets here in the morning to do the dis-invite spell. Just let me check the upstairs before you go up there and make sure there’s nothing there that shouldn’t be.”
Buffy went quickly up stairs and carefully checked all the rooms, including the closets, before locking the windows closed and calling downstairs to let her mother know it was all right to go to bed.
Meanwhile, Joyce was putting the hot chocolate ingredients away and the mugs in the dishwasher. She watched the vampire from the corners of her eyes and saw that he had a very pensive look on his face.
“So, in her own time my daughter and you are together?”
He started at the sound of her voice and shifted uncomfortably.
“Well we were, it seems. She really hasn’t told me much about it, jus’ that we’ve known each other for a long time and I help her with her work. And, that ‘m not around anymore.”
“You left her?” There was a touch of motherly disapproval in her voice.
Spike grinned at her ruefully, “Don’t be grabbin’ a weapon, there, Mum. I think ‘m not around in the now-he’s-a-big-pile-‘o-dust sense of the word.”
“Oh. Oh! I’m sorry, Spike.” Joyce looked horrified at his casual acceptance of his death.
“Not to worry, Joyce. Slayer’s planning to do things a little differently this time. Wants to avoid all the bad stuff she knows about. Dunno if it’s gonna work – didn’t keep the poof from losing his soul again, or newbie from meetin’ her end –“ he stopped at Joyce’s muffled gasp and ducked his head.
“Sorry, Joyce. I forgot you didn’t know about that. Slayer’s really gonna kill me now.”
At her startled expression, he grinned again, “Figure of speech, luv. Jus’ meant she’ll be brassed off that I let it slip out like that .”
Shaking her head at the way Buffy, and now Spike, had her in a permanent state of befuddlement the past week, she said good-night and went to meet her daughter at the bottom of the stairs.
After assuring her mother that the upstairs was safe, and making her promise not to open any windows and to scream if she heard the slightest unusual noise, she kissed her mother good-night. If Joyce was confused by the unusual amounts of physical affection Buffy had shown this past week, she resolutely pushed any thoughts of why that might be to the back of her mind.
Chapter Twelve
After sending her mother to bed, Buffy walked back into the kitchen to fix herself something to eat and drink. As she rummaged through the refrigerator, looking for a coke or something with caffeine in it, she looked over her shoulder at the blond vampire still sitting on a kitchen stool.
“Want something?” she asked, then flushed as his gaze went over her jeans-clad rear end.
When he saw the flush he laughed and gave her his best leer. “What’re you offerin’, pet?”
“You’re a pig, Spike.” Again the automatic insult caused her to squeeze her eyes shut briefly, but she shook off the feeling and smiled at him as she closed the refrigerator. “It’s a good thing I’ve had years to get used to it or it might’ve got you a bloody nose.”
Spike hadn’t missed the twinge of pain he’d caused her and he was instantly sorry he’d caused it. Since she didn’t mention it, he decided to pretend he hadn’t noticed and he just leered at her again.
Buffy rolled her eyes and came over to sit on the other stool. While she nibbled on a sandwich, she said, without meeting his eyes, “Thank you for staying her with mom. I really appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome, pet. You mum’s a right nice woman. I like her. Wouldn’t want anything to happen to her.”
To his surprise, she again squeezed her eyes shut and he could see the pain on her face. Once again, he was off his stool and holding her gently, allowing her to lean into his chest.
“Bloody hell, pet. Has anything good happened to you in the next few years? It’s gettin’ so ‘m afraid to say anythin’. If I wanted to make you cry, I’d be chewin’ on your neck or somethin’ more fun than jus’ talkin’.”
Her shoulders shook with combined tears and laughter as she slipped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest. For just a few minutes, she allowed herself to enjoy the comfort of his familiar embrace before she remembered that this Spike, as sympathetic as he might seem to be, was not in love with her and probably didn’t want her tears soaking his shirt.
“I’m sorry,” she sniffed, pushing herself away slightly to look up at him. “I got your shirt all wet. You’re going to think I’m such a crybaby.”
“Naw, pet. I know you’re not a crybaby. Never seen a Slayer like you before. You’ve got friends and family, things that should make you weak; but instead, it’s like they make you stronger.”
“Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t,” she said cryptically.
They stood together awkwardly. Spike was enjoying the feel of her warm body in his arms and the unique scent she had. Buffy was reluctant to pull out of his embrace until she had to. With her eyes shut, she could pretend he was her Spike and that he loved her.
Finally, when it became obvious somebody had to do something, she tightened her arms around his waist in a small hug and said, “thank you,” before stepping back from him.
Spike dropped his arms, a little surprised at how hard it was to let her go, and stepped back also.
“Anyway,” she began with a shaky laugh, “what I was starting to say when my sniffles so rudely interrupted me, is that I appreciate what you did, but now that I’m home, you can—“
“Got no where to go, luv. Don’t fancy sittin’ around listening to your ex and Dru shaggin’ each other silly.”
He kept his tone light, but Buffy could see the pain in his eyes and the part of her that wasn’t jealous of his feelings for the brunette vampire ached for him. She put her hand on his arm and asked softly, “I’m going to stay up and watch TV until the sun is up. Do you want to stay and keep me company? Help me stay awake?”
“Sure, pet. Be my pleasure.”
They moved into the living room and after a laughing tussle over the remote, settled on the couch to watch an old movie. They both sat stiffly at first – Buffy because she didn’t want to appear clingy by snuggling up to him, as much as she wanted to do so; and Spike because he didn’t want her to think he was trying to take advantage of the way she felt about the Spike that wasn’t him.
But as the night wore on and Buffy was having a harder and harder time staying awake, her weight gradually shifted toward the slight dip in the cushions his weight was causing. When she caught herself falling asleep and slipping toward him, she came upright with a start and looked around quickly. She saw the vampire looking at her with amusement, his eyes twinkling.
“What kind of a slayer falls asleep sittin’ next to a master vampire?” he teased her gently. “Seems like a career endin’ move to me, pet.”
When she didn’t answer him, but just looked embarrassed, he put his arm around her and gently pulled her toward him.
“Was just kiddin’ with you, luv. I’m not sleepy. You can rest on me and I’ll wake you if you’re needed.”
“I don’t think that’s a very good idea,” she said softly, with a grateful smile.
He raised his eyebrow and tilted his head. “Don’t trust me, pet?” She couldn’t decide if she heard a touch of hurt in his voice or not.
“I do. You know I do. It’s just...it’s too easy to forget that you’re not...not my Spike. Not yet, anyway,” she added with a trace of a smile.
He sighed and pulled her into his lap with both arms. She stiffened with resistance for a minute, then relaxed and curled into him.
He though for a minute about what he wanted to say, then began softly, “I’m not your Spike, Buffy. I don’t know in this time if I ever will be. I know you think that I will, but I just can’t see it right now. And I’m sorry I can’t. Believe me. I can see that you’d be very easy to love. But I’m a one woman kinda man. Always have been.”
“Love’s bitch,” she murmured into his chest.
He drew back in surprise, then chuckled and leaned in to rest his chin on her head. “I guess you could say that, pet.”
“I didn’t say it. You did. Long time ago – well, no actually, about a year from now...never mind. It’s your phrase, not mine.”
“Yeah, sounds like me,” he admitted, chuckling again. He unconsciously nuzzled her hair, inhaling the clean, herbal smell.
Buffy almost held her breath as she felt him breathing in her scent. She knew her hair was one of his favorite things to scent and play with, and she was afraid to say or do anything that might make him stop. She rested one of her hands on top of his arm and began to gently move her thumb back and forth in a soothing motion. She was enjoying the feel of his cool, smooth skin as she stroked her thumb back and forth idly and she almost didn’t notice when his breathing stopped and he became very still.
She did, however, notice the growing bulge under her rear and she shifted slightly to slide it between her thighs. A growl from the vampire made her catch her breath, and she turned her head and tipped it up so that she could nuzzle his neck. She nipped on the spot below his jaw that she knew was sensitive and elicited another growl from him.
“What’re you doin’, luv?” he asked hoarsely. “You know you’ve got an unfair advantage here; knowin’ me like you do...”
He shuddered when she ran her tongue down the skin of his throat and sucked the skin above his collarbone into her mouth. She sucked hard on the skin until she knew the borrowed blood was staining his pale flesh, then she whispered, “Mine.”
Spike shot upright, almost dropping her off his lap.
“What the hell?”
Buffy took his face in her hands and made him look in her eyes. “When you take Drusilla away from here – and I know you are going to leave – I want to be sure you know there’s a reason to come back. When you’re ready. I’ll wait for you.”
“Buffy...” the vampire’s face was a study in suppressed desire, pained understanding and frustrated affection. “Buffy, I can’t pretend I don’t feel something’ for you. Don’t know what it is, don’t know why, but I won’t deny it’s there. But, I’ve told you. I love Dru. Have for over a hundred years. I can’t love you, Slayer. That’s just the way it is.”
To his amazement, instead of being sad, Buffy shook her head and laughed to herself. “So that’s what it sounds like to hear that and know it’s not ... Poor Spike.”
She looked into his puzzled eyes. “Someday I’ll tell you why it’s funny that you would say that to me. But, not now. Now I want to make love to you. Will you let me do that, Spike? Please?”
Buffy briefly wondered if a person could be killed by a heavy dose of irony as she waited for Spike to answer her. She could see the internal struggle taking place and knew that he wasn’t struggling so much with cheating on Dru as he was wondering if making love with Buffy would be fair to the Slayer.
(Puts him way ahead of me in the thinking about somebody else’s feelings department. But then, I already knew that didn’t I? I’m the user in this relationship, not him.)
She touched his face gently with her hand and looked into his conflicted eyes.
“It’s okay. It really is. I know what I’m doing. Just let me have this before you leave. Okay?”
“Well,” he tried to sound disinterested, even as his hands began sliding over her body, “it guess it’s the evil thing to do. And I’m definitely evil, so...”
“That you are, Big Bad,” she said as his lips closed on hers.
Their tongues met and tangled, fighting for dominance as they let lust take over their bodies. Spike’s hands slid under her shirt to move over her warm silky skin and she moaned when his hand tentatively cupped one breast. She pulled on his tee shirt until he shifted forward to allow her to pull it up and over his head. She immediately fastened her mouth on his nipple and began pulling on it lightly, smiling to herself when he hissed in appreciation.
It soon became obvious that the couch was not going to allow them the room they needed and Buffy slid off his lap to the floor, pulling him down with her. When he tried to lay her down, she shook her head and pushed him gently down on his back.
“No, Spike. I’m making love to you tonight. (the way you always wanted me to and I was too afraid to let you have.) You just lie still. Let me pleasure you.”
He looked up at the vision straddling his hips and nodded silently. What ever she wanted – whatever was going to make her feel better when he was gone. He would give her that.
With her blond hair hanging in her face, her cheeks flushed with heat and her eyes heavy with desire, he thought he’d never seen anything so beautiful. He had to fight to remain still while she slowly kissed her way down his body, pausing at the waistband of his jeans to lick his belly button while she worked on the snap and zipper.
His freed erection sprang out into her hand and she began to stroke it softly while the other hand tried to shove his jeans off. When one hand wasn’t enough, she planted a kiss on the weeping tip before sliding down his legs to untied his boots and pull them and his jeans off. Except for lifting his hips to allow her to remove his jeans, Spike remained obediently still, waiting to see what she would do next.
Sitting on his now-bare legs, Buffy pulled her own shirt up over her head and threw it and her bra onto the couch behind her. He couldn’t control his gasp as her perfect breasts bounced lightly in front of him and his hands reached for them. She lightly smacked them back down, saying, “Ah, ah. I’ll let you know when you can touch.”
“Bossy little bint, aren’t you?” he growled, but he was smiling when he said it, and obediently crossed his arms behind his head. Buffy lost focus for a second when that position showed off his wonderfully lean and muscular torso and bulging biceps.
(Damn show-off vampire. Thinks he’s pretty hot stuff) she grumbled to herself, even as she had to admit that the sight in front of her was making her mouth water.
When he teased her for sitting there, mouth agape, with, “Cat got your tongue, Slayer?” she narrowed her eyes and leaned down to lick his cock from bottom to top. She then swirled her tongue around the head, sticking it under the foreskin and pushed it out of her way so she could lick the pre-cum off.
“What do you think?” she asked sweetly. “Have I lost my tongue, vampire?”
Before he recovered himself to answer her, she bent over him again and began working his cock into her throat as far as she could get it. When his hips pushed up toward her, she held him down with one hand on his lower abdomen. With the other hand, she gently massaged his balls, pulling gently on the sac before grasping the base of his cock with her hand to hold it still while she continued to move her mouth up and down on it.
Each time she pulled it in to her mouth she got it a little further down her throat. If her mouth hadn’t been so stretched by his ample girth, she would have been smiling at the incoherent sounds coming from the vampire. When the sounds he was making told her he was ready to come, she took a deep breath and began swallowing. The swallowing action was all it took to send him over the edge and he muffled his shout with his fist as he emptied himself into her throat.
As soon as he dropped back, taking totally unnecessary recovery breaths, she stood up, one leg on each side of his hips. Spike stared up at her in awe as she stood there, legs apart, hands on hips, a self-satisfied smile on her face. She cupped her breasts with her hands and lifted them slightly, rubbing her thumbs across the hard nipples.
She heard him growl and put one bare foot on his chest to hold him down.
“Just wait your turn, there, vampire.”
He watched through narrowed eyes as she unfastened her pants and peeled them off down her legs, stepping off his body for a second to free up one foot. Then she straddled him again and pushed them down and off the other foot. He stared up at her worshipfully, taking in the sight of her long tanned legs ending in neatly trimmed light brown curls that glistened with moisture.
“I could look at this sight for hours, luv,” he barely managed to get out.
“I know,” she smiled. “It’s one of your favorite things. Right after what I just did to you.”
“Please tell me I taught you to do that, pet. I would hate to think you wasted a talent like that on the great poof, or some human prat.”
“You pretty much taught me everything I know, Spike,” she answered, suddenly serious. “I didn’t know anything about love or love making until you.”
“You tellin’ me I popped your cherry?” he asked in amazement.
“Well, no. Not in my time line – but...” she gestured at her sixteen year old body. “I guess this one’s yours. If you want it,” she added, looking away with sudden shyness.
So fast that she wasn’t sure he’d even moved, he’d reached up, wrapped his arms around her waist and brought her down to the floor with him. He rolled them over so that she was looking up at him with wide green eyes as he settled his hips between her thighs.
“IF I want it? Bloody hell, woman. Don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything quite so much in my unlife.” He studied her youthful face for a few seconds and asked softly, “Are you sure you want me to do this, pet? I know the real you in there isn’t a shy little virgin, but you could do whatever you want with this body. Doesn’t have to be me.”
“I WANT it to be you, Spike. Nobody else is ever going to touch this body. It’s yours. Please take it. Give me that to keep until you come back.”
He shut his eyes briefly to hide from the love he could see openly expressed in hers. As much as he wanted the nubile, young body underneath him, he didn’t want to lie to her about his intentions. He groaned and buried his face in her neck.
“Want you so much, Buffy. Want to bury myself in your heat and stay there for weeks.”
She wriggled her hips as though to ask, “what’s the problem?” and he chuckled in spite of himself. When he still didn’t make any attempt to enter her, she sighed and nudged him with her nose until he raised his head.
“Spike, I know you’re not my Spike. I know you don’t love me – that you think you’re taking advantage of me somehow. And I love that you can worry about that when I never...” She pushed aside all thoughts of the months she used his body with no thought to what she might be doing to him emotionally, and continued, “but I AM a big girl. And I want this. I want to feel you inside me, feel you...I just want to feel you. Trust me. I know what I’m doing.”
His perceptive blue eyes bored into her completely open and honest green ones until he saw what he wanted to know and he nodded his head as he leaned toward her mouth.
“Alright, luv. That pretty much uses up any ability I might have had to talk myself out of it.”
With that he captured her mouth again and began an oral assault on her that continued until she was gasping his name and almost sobbing with need. He kissed her until she had to stop to gasp for air, and while she was filling her lungs, he moved his mouth down to her breasts and feasted on the pebble-like nipples he found there.
When he began sucking on one of them and she arched up into his mouth with a whimper, he smiled to himself as he added, “likes her nipples sucked on” to the things he was learning about her. He worked his way down her body, tasting her silky skin as he went and committing the feel and taste and scent of her body to his memory.
When he got to her damp curls, the scent of her arousal made his cock so hard it ached. As much as loved Drusilla, he had to admit that she had never had this effect on him. He buried his face in Buffy’s crotch and began to seek out the source of the ambrosia he was inhaling. He pushed his tongue gently into her folds and ran it around the outer lips, dipping down to her entrance to lap up the continuous moisture he found there.
When he began flicking her clit with his tongue, her soft whimpers became higher and more frantic as he teased her unmercifully. When the whimpers turned to sobs, he relented and pulled the throbbing nubbin into his mouth and sucked on it until her hips shot up and her thighs clenched around his head.
Before she could recover from that orgasm, he had crawled up her body and placed the head of his cock at her opening. He nudged his way in as far as he could go, and when he met the barrier they both knew he was going to find, he paused to ask, “Are you ready, luv? I’ll make it as painless as I can.”
Her response was to grab his ass with both hands and pull him toward her hard enough to begin the tear. Fighting to control his demon when the scent of blood reached his nostrils, he pushed gently, entering her a little further with each push and stretching the tissue a little more each time.
When she brought her legs up around his back to give him better access he stopped trying to ease his way in and with a shove of his hips, he buried himself to the hilt in her warm wetness. He held still once he was in, while she got her breath back and got used to him. Her walls felt like warm velvet and he groaned when she tightened them around him gasping, “Oh my god, I’ve missed this. Missed you.”
He began moving slowly, giving her time to feel the pleasure out weigh the remaining pain, but it wasn’t long before he was pounding into her and gasping his own nonsense words in her ear.
“You feel so good, luv. Oh, like that, Slayer. Squeeze me again, pet. Feels so good. You are so tight, so hot and wet for me. Oh my god, Buffy. Feels like bloody heaven, your cunny does.”
“Spike, Spike, Spike,” Buffy maintained a steady chant of his name as she wrapped her arms and legs around him as though she would hold him to her by pure slayer strength.
When he felt her begin to quiver and her whimpered chant turned into a keening wail, he let himself surrender to the tension building in his balls and he joined her in finding release. As he did, his demon emerged and before he could stop himself, his fangs had nicked the skin on her neck and he was lapping at the drops of blood there.
Once again the taste of her blood was overwhelming and he found himself murmuring, “mine” against her skin.
“Yours,” she breathed in agreement. “Always yours.”
Chapter Thirteen
As coherent thought came back, the vampire dropped his head to the floor in despair.
(Bloody hell. I claimed her. What was I...This is not good. I claimed a slayer. And after tellin’ her I’m leavin’ here and never comin’ back.)
He picked his head up and pulled back to meet her joyful eyes. He was still buried inside her warmth and truly had no desire to leave that place yet, but his shock at what his demon had done was stronger than the urge to stay there until he was hard enough to have another go. He reluctantly pulled out of her gently pulsing walls and rolled off to the side on his back.
He kept one arm around her and she immediately curled into his body, throwing one arm across his chest and looking up at him expectantly.
“Buffy, pet, I’m sorry. I never meant to do that—didn’t even really bite you. It was just a little nick and the demon...”
“The demon tried to claim me. I know what it means, Spike. Why do you think I said it to you when I gave you that spectacular – if I say so myself – hickey?”
“But I shouldn’t have done it, luv. I’m not plannin’ on comin’ back. I keep trying to tell you that, but you just won’t listen to reason. Bloody stubborn woman! Why won’t you believe me?”
“Because I know you, Spike,” she said softly, reaching up with one hand to stroke his agitated face. “I know you’re going to come back to me. It might take a while, and...and I won’t be very happy while you’re gone, but I know you’re coming back. And I’ll be waiting for you.”
“I can’t leave her, Buffy. She needs me. She depends on me to take care of her and to...love her.”
Buffy wisely refrained from pointing out that this woman who was so dependent on him was currently banging his grandsire so frequently and loudly that it had driven him out of the building. She knew that Spike was blaming Angelus for it and would forgive Dru. It was his nature to forgive the women he loved, no matter how much they hurt him.
“I know, my love,” she said, stroking his face again. “It’s okay. You wouldn’t be you if you could switch allegiance that easily. I have to earn your love. And Dru has to—“ She stopped herself from revealing what she knew of his future with the insane vampire. “you’ll come back when you’re ready, and I’ll be here.”
The confidence in her voice frightened him. She was so sure of herself. Just as he was sure that he could never love anyone the way he did his dark princess. The dark princess who was currently seeing that her sire received continuous happiness-inducing orgasms all night. That thought made him tighten his arm around the Slayer and she slid over onto his body, reminding him that he had his own source of happiness at hand.
Giving up any attempt to convince her that she was wrong about him and their future, he ran his hands down the silky skin of her back and cupped her round butt cheeks in his hands, pulling her up so that the head of his rapidly hardening cock was nudging at her entrance.
“You okay for another go, pet?” he asked, concerned that she might be sore. “Don’t want to hurt you...not much, anyway,” he added with a leer.
“I can handle it, vampire. I’m a Slayer, remember? I’ve been hurt a lot worse for a lot less reward. You haven’t begun to hurt me enough to—“
She was interrupted when he pushed her hips down onto his cock and she couldn’t control the slight flinch when he pushed against her torn flesh. Immediately, he stopped and looked at her anxiously. Even while he cursed his inner William for being the biggest ponce in the world, he was apologizing and lifting her off.
“It’s okay,” she said softly, nuzzling his neck and licking the mark she’d made, “Please, don’t stop.”
“I think it’s bleedin’ again, luv,” he managed to get out. His demon was almost drooling as the smell of her blood mixed with arousal sent it into a frenzy.
“Maybe you could kiss it better?” she offered breathlessly.
“Good plan,” he agreed, pulling her up to his face. “Nothin’ like vamp saliva to help a wound heal...” he settled her over his mouth and let his tongue slide inside to lap up the mixture of blood and moisture he found there. Buffy gasped when she felt his cool tongue moving around inside her aching quim, searching for any trace of bleeding or torn tissue.
While she supported herself on her knees and hands, she tried to let him guide her hips wherever he wanted them to be. It wasn’t long, though, before she was moving her hips in small circles, unable to keep still as his talented tongue moved from her now soothed entrance to the little nubbin begging for attention. When he pulled it into his mouth and bit down gently she shrieked, trying to muffle the sound by turning her head toward her shoulder.
He quickly pulled her back down and without pausing, slipped into her thoroughly ready entrance. There was no pain this time, and no blood as Spike’s attentions had set the healing in motion and her accelerated Slayer healing had taken over. She sat up and smiled down at him as she began to squeeze his cock rhythmically. When his hands reached for her breasts this time, she didn’t bat them away, but arched her back and thrust them into his hands.
He didn’t think he’d ever seen anything as beautiful or erotic as the sun tanned girl writhing on top of him. Without moving her hips at all, she was managing to bring him to the edge of another orgasm just using her internal muscles.
When his appreciative murmuring took on an urgency that couldn’t be ignored, she fell forward onto his chest and allowed his moving hips to give her clit the friction it needed. With matching gasps, the two powerful blonds shook with intensity of their orgasms and clutched each other as waves of pleasure swept over them.
This time, Spike remained inside her warm body as she lay against his chest and whispered his name. He held her lightly, more than willing to be used as a pillow as long as he could stay inside her warmth a while longer.
Buffy stayed where she was as long as she could, knowing this was the last time she would have him like this until Drusilla’s infidelity sent him running back to Sunnydale next year. As much as she dreaded the upcoming months without him, the knowledge that he was alive and that he would be coming back made it bearable and she prepared herself for losing him again, albeit, temporarily this time.
“I love you, Spike,” she breathed in his ear. Without waiting for a response, she kissed him gently and lifted herself off his body, suppressing the whimper that threatened to emerge when he slid out of her.
Spike made no attempt to hide his reaction to the loss of her warmth, and he growled when she moved away from him. She just looked at him sadly and said, “It’s almost dawn. You can stay here today, if you want. There’s a cot in the basement. I have to get some sleep and then see what Willow and Jenny have come up with in the way of soul-restoring spells.”
“You’re going to try to put it back?” he asked incredulously. “Now that you know it’s not permanent? Are you daft? Do you have any idea what Angelus is like, Buffy?”
“Actually, I do,” she answered quite seriously, as she pulled on her jeans. She’d given up the search for her underwear, although she’d been sure she’d taken them off at the same time as the jeans. Completely ignoring Spike’s indignant snort, she turned her back to him so that he could fasten her bra for her and continued talking without answering his grumbled, “I’m more used to undoin’ these, pet.”
“If Jenny and Willow haven’t been able to come up with it today, I’ll...I’ll probably kill him. I can’t take a chance that he’ll be able to...” she stopped and shook herself. “But I’m sure between the two of them they’ve been able to find something. Even if it’s only a temporary fix until we figure out a way to anchor his soul. I owe him that much. All you have to do is help me distract him and control Drusilla until we can get the spell done.”
He peered at her uncertainly. This business-like Slayer was quite different from the perky little girl who’d been tormenting him since he arrived in Sunnydale. And different from the experienced, affectionate woman in a girl’s body that he’d just made love with. He was a little chilled at her matter of fact discussion of killing the vampire she professed to still care about.
This Slayer was different from the other’s he’d fought in more ways than one. He reminded himself that she’d survived him, Angelus, and five or six more years of vampires, demons and potentially world ending apocalypses. He looked at her with new respect and asked, “Then what, pet?”
“Then I guess you’ll leave and take her away from here. She’s healed now and if she stays here I’ll have to kill her sooner or later. If you love her, you’ll take her very far away. That was your plan wasn’t it?” She looked at him steadily. “Make Dru better and kill another Slayer?”
His bowels clenched as she reminded him of his original intent.
“I don’t want to kill you anymore, Buffy. You know that. But I won’t let you stake Drusilla.”
She looked at him coldly. “You couldn’t stop me if I wanted to do it. And I should. She’s a killer.” She stared into his suddenly narrowed eyes and continued with a sigh, “But you’d never forgive me, and I don’t want that. So I’m letting you take her away. Just be sure she doesn’t come back. No train massacres this time around.”
He knew she was referring to something that had happened in her future, and filed it away to worry about later. He stood up and began to dress, hiding her lace underwear in his back pocket as he pulled on his jeans. When he was dressed and had put his duster back on, they stood, both looking awkwardly at the floor.
Finally Buffy moved toward him and laid her hand against his chest. He could feel the heat from her hand through his tee shirt and unconsciously leaned in to it. She ran her hand lightly over his chest, smoothing the shirt out as she did, then dropped it to her side.
“You better get back to them, if you aren’t going to stay here. I don’t want them to suspect you’re helping me.”
“No way to hide what we’ve been doin’, pet. You’re all over me, jus’ like I’m all over you. A raw fledgling would know what we’ve been doin’ – not to mention our new neck decorations.” He gestured to the small cuts his fangs had made on her neck and the slowly fading love bite she’d left on him.
“A shower and a change of clothes will take care of most of it,” she suggested. “Do you really think they’re going to know where the marks came from? If they can even see them, by then.”
“I dunno, love. I didn’t really bite you, so I don’t think it’s gonna be an obvious claim. But if either one of them gets close enough to try to drain you...I dunno. We’ll see, I guess.” He looked at her closely. “Don’t think it’s gonna be real strong, and it probably won’t last once I’m gone.”
He saw the disappointment flash across her face briefly, but before he could say anything else, the Slayer’s mask was back in place and he decided to let it go.
“Ok, then. I guess that’s it until we’re ready to make our move. You’ll just have to wait until we show up, I guess. I hope it’s going to be tonight, but it might take a day or two. If I could think of some way to let you know...”
“ ’S alright, pet. I’ll jus’ hang close to the two and keep an eye on ‘em. Hard to tell what they might get up to what with Angelus havin’ to be good for so many years. He’s probably bustin’ with schemes to destroy the world or somethin’”
“Good guess,” she smiled at him sadly. “But I’m going to try to keep it from getting that far this time.”
“Sun’s comin’ up, luv. I’ve got to go. Got to find a place I can clean up before I go back to the factory.”
“I know,” she said softly, tilting her face up toward his. He leaned down and their lips met one last time in a kiss that started out very chaste and deepened into something he didn’t want to examine too closely. He knew that the taste of this girl’s lips would haunt him for a long time to come and he almost groaned as she pulled away for air.
“Good-bye, Spike,” she whispered, dipping her hand into his back pocket and stealing back her underwear.
“Hey! I stole those fair and square, Slayer! And how did you...” he stopped and shook his head at himself. “Oh yeah, almost forgot.”
“I know you,” she smirked, waving them in his face.
“God help me, you do,” he said as he let himself out the door into the rapidly dwindling darkness. “You do.”
Chapter Fourteen
Buffy stood in the doorway until she couldn’t see his flaring leather coat anymore, then slowly closed it, fighting back the feeling that he was leaving her forever. She walked around the living room, picking cushions and brushing any trace of what they’d been doing out of the rug.
Just as she had when she used to leave his crypt without any sleep, she went up to her room and got into bed without cleaning herself off. She drifted off to sleep surrounded by the scent of Spike and really relaxed for the first time in years.
After a few hours of restorative sleep, she showered, got dressed and headed for the school to see what Jenny and Willow had come up with. She was relieved to find that they had found the basic words of the curse on a web site dealing with ancient gypsy customs. Willow was confident that between the soul-restoring spell she had found, and Jenny’s curse, they could restore Angel’s soul if they could just get close enough to him without being killed.
“Okay,” Buffy said confidently, “That’s where Spike and I come in—“
“Spike? What does the bleached menace have to do with it?” Xander sputtered. “Isn’t he part of the problem?”
“Xander, were you not listening the other night?” Giles’ impatience was evident in his voice. “As much as we might prefer it not be the case, Buffy trusts Spike to help her out when she needs it. Please remain quiet if you can’t contribute anything useful.”
The angry boy stood up and spread his arms.
“The only thing I’d like to contribute is a hammer to help her drive stakes into all three of those bloodsuckers. I knew Angel would break bad some day, and now she wants us to trust another undead thing on her say so. I say if all she’s learned in six years is to switch one bloodsucking boyfriend for another…she’s not as smart as she wants us to think she is.”
There was a tense silence in the room when Xander finished his tirade and Buffy knew that everyone else was thinking their own version of the same thing. For just a second, she was back in her time, breaking Spike’s heart every time she left him; so afraid her friends would find out that she was sleeping with him and condemn her for it. She shook those memories off and fixed Xander with a cold stare.
He’d never seen an adult Buffy in full Slayer mode, and he unconsciously cringed back against the table while her watcher moved to intercept her if she should attack the boy. Instead, Buffy just glared at him until he sat down with an ashamed expression on his face.
When he was again seated at the table, she looked around the room and said, “Let me try this one more time. In the future, my future, Spike helps us multiple times. He has opportunities to kill each of you several times, but never does it. Even after he’s—even when he is temporarily rendered incapable of physically hurting any of you, he could have had minions do it. And, when I’m…gone…he stays and takes care of…and he helps all of you patrol. He saves each of you multiple times. You and the people you care about. You’d have been dead 10 times over without his extra muscle.
“I’m pretty sure I mentioned the burning to death to save the world from the First Evil – just in case all the other world saveage, enduring torture, being constantly insulted by all of you and still helping us….You know what? I don’t have to defend him or my feelings for him. He earned every bit of trust and respect I can give him and if I can keep him from having to endure any of that other stuff this time? Bonus points for me.”
She turned away from their open mouthed stares and said, “Now let’s figure out when and how we’re going to do this. I think late afternoon would be good. They’ll just be waking up and probably won’t have left the factory yet.”
As though the whole previous scene hadn’t taken place, she went back to planning the afternoon’s assault on the Factory. When she said that Spike was to be allowed to take Drusilla with him, she squelched Xander’s complaint with one look and went on with the plan.
Spike broke into a vacant home on a deserted street and showered off any trace of the Slayer. He stepped under the water wearing all his clothes and rinsed her scent off them as best he could, then stripped and let the water run over his body.
He leaned against the tiled wall, supporting himself with one hand while the hot water beat down on his shoulders. The heat made him think of Buffy and the incredible way her warmth drew him. He’d never been attracted to a human woman since he’d been turned. In fact, he rarely looked at anyone other than his dark princess, even though he knew she occasionally strayed.
But this tiny girl, this incredibly sexy woman in a girl’s body, reached places in his psyche that he didn’t even know existed. Never had he met a woman, vampire or slayer, who was his equal in a fight; and here was one that could take him whenever she wanted to. He didn’t doubt her when she said she knew all his moves. When he thought back to the fights he’d seen, he could see it. The sudden leg sweep after a feinted high kick, the frontal attack that turned into a flip over the opponent’s head, those were his moves. Moves he’d taught her.
That led to thoughts of the other things he’d obviously taught her and he was suddenly hard again remembering her mouth and hands on his cock. He groaned with the ache that was settling in his balls to match the throbbing in his cock at the thought of the soft and yet so strong body he’d been allowed to enjoy. Even thoughts of Dru and Angelus, shagging each other bloody back in the factory couldn’t push away the vision of her tanned body riding him, and with an angry snarl, he grabbed the soap, quickly using its slippery foam to take the edge off what he was afraid was about to become a permanent condition.
When he had finished his shower, he put his damp clothes back on and, stealing a curtain off the window to throw over his head, he bolted out the door and down a manhole. Using his uncanny sense of direction and smell, he found his way to the factory through the sewers and tunnels under the city. He wasn’t happy with what the water was doing to his boots, but thought it would help cover any lingering smell from the Slayer.
He gingerly fingered the place on his neck where she had sucked so hard on his skin that she left a mark. He remembered her whispered, “mine” and shuddered a little at the thought of being bound to a Slayer. Telling himself that there hadn’t been any actual exchange of blood, and no reciprocating on his part, he tried to shrug it off as a heat-of-the-moment kind of thing that she didn’t mean.
When he finally emerged through the basement of the factory, he was, for once, more grateful than jealous that Angelus and Dru were so wrapped up in each other. They barely acknowledged his arrival and paid no attention when he shed his wet clothes and replaced them with new dry ones. He threw the wet ones down to another level of the building and went off to sleep by himself in a far corner of the big room.
Angelus and Dru went back to where they had been since the vampire’s return to the fold – on the double bed mattress that Spike had installed in a side room for Dru to rest on until she recovered. The sounds coming from the room told Spike she definitely had her strength back and he squeezed his eyes shut and tried to block out the sounds of her screams and whimpers as she cried out her happiness at her “daddy’s” return.
He was finally able to drift off to sleep when he allowed himself to visualize silky golden hair, soft pink lips, and warm green eyes smiling up at him.
When Spike woke up, his instincts told him it was late afternoon and he got up and stretched, wondering if the red-haired witch and the gypsy woman had come up with a way to shove a soul back into the other vampire.
(That or the Slayer’s gonna shove a sharp piece of wood into his chest.) he thought wryly. (No way is Angelus gonna take this little girl. I’m guessing she knows him as well as she knows me and he never was all that great a fighter anyway. More of a bully than a warrior.)
He was smiling at the thought of the ass-kicking Buffy was going to give Angelus when he and Dru came out of the their room. Dru cocked her head at Spike and began in a sing song voice, “Spike’s been a bad puppy. My sweet William’s been playing in the sun. The sun makes him smile, but it will burn him.”
Angelus just shook his head at her babbling, but Spike got very still as he realized what she was saying. Even without being close enough to smell him or see the mark on his neck, she knew what he’d been doing. He decided to brave it out and shrugged as he lit a cigarette and blew smoke at her.
“Fair’s fair, pet. Jus’ getting’ a little of my own back.”
She rolled her eyes in a way that told him she wasn’t fooled at all, but then spun away from Angelus and began to dance slowly to music only she could hear. As she danced, she sang nonsense words that meant nothing to either vampire.
Angelus didn’t approach the younger vamp. He clearly expected Spike to be very angry about losing Dru and was wary of him. Even though Angelus was the older of the two by almost a century, he’d spent enough years toughening Spike up and teaching him to fight to respect the other vamp’s fists and fangs. No one took joy in a fight the way Spike did, and Angelus had no desire to be on the receiving end of the other vamp’s jealous rage. He was mildly surprised that Spike didn’t appear angrier than he was, but put if off as the result of an all-night binge and a hangover.
He extended an uncertain peace offering to his grandchild, saying, “We’re going to go hunting as soon as the sun is down all the way. Do you want to come with us?”
Spike looked at him coldly and turned away without answering. Suddenly he felt the fading mark on his neck tingle and his head flew up so that he could listen.
“Show time,” he whispered to himself as he waited for the Slayer to appear.
Chapter Fifteen
Buffy felt a tingle in the healed scratches on her neck and knew that Spike’s unintentional claiming was still active. She paused and shut her eyes for a second and was rewarded with a wash of excitement and anticipation that she knew was coming from the blond vampire. Wishing she knew more about claiming and the side effects, she tried to send a message of confidence and warning but couldn’t tell if he received it or not.
In a whispered conversation, she told Jenny and Willow where they could hide while they worked on the combined curse/spell. Her intent was to keep Angelus busy fighting her long enough for them to work their magic on his demon.
“I promise you,” she said to Willow’s frightened face, “I will not let him near you. If it comes down to it, I’ll stake him and let the future worry about itself. You just stay behind the machinery, and let me do the rest.”
“And what about William the Bloody and Drusilla?” Jenny asked quietly. “I believe you when you say Spike won’t harm you or us, but what is to prevent his consort from doing to us what she did to Kendra?”
“Spike will,” Buffy said shortly. “All right, let’s go.”
When Spike felt Buffy approaching, he suddenly became very animated and began stalking toward Angelus, growling about his having “taken my soddin’ woman for the last time.” Keeping one eye on Drusilla, who had stopped dancing to watch with interest the two vampires preparing to fight over her, he insulted, provoked and generally distracted Angel to prevent the older vampire from hearing the entrance of Buffy and the witches.
Had Drusilla not whirled at the sound of Willow sneezing in the dusty room he might have been able to keep the other vamp busy until the spell was well underway. However, the sneeze and Dru’s subsequent wail of, “The sun is here to take my daddy away,” tore Angelus’ attention off the advancing blond and focused it on the petite form entering the room.
“Well, hello, lover,” he crooned. “I didn’t really expect to see you so soon. Thought you’d want to take a while to mourn the passing of your boy friend.”
Buffy blinked at him in genuine confusion for a second, before she realized that he meant his soulled self and not Spike. Angel had not heard her speech about Spike’s unconditional love for her and apparently thought he was still the love of her life, even though she thought she had made it clear that they had no future together.
When she realized what he meant, she smiled grimly and said, “Haven’t lost him yet, demon.”
While she and Angel were exchanging pleasantries, Drusilla was working her way toward the Slayer, swaying back and forth like a cobra as she did so.
“Sunshine thinks she has captured my sweet William. She wants to pull both my lovely boys into the light with her, but they don’t want to leave their dark princess, do they Miss Edith?”
She cocked her head as though listening for a reply, then snarled at the Slayer.
“Miss Edith says you tried to take what’s mine. She says I should kill you like I did the other Slayer.”
As Dru moved closer, trying to get the Slayer to look her in the eye, Spike was crossing the room swiftly and he grabbed her around the waist just as she got to Buffy. Although the slayer was careful not to look the insane vampire in the eyes, she couldn’t help but be distracted by her weaving approach and sing song voice.
When Spike grabbed the dark vampire before she could reach for the Slayer, Buffy’s attention was distracted enough that Angel was able to leap for her, his weight carrying them both to the floor. The force of the fall with the vampire’s large body on top of her, knocked the wind out of her and she was immobilized for a few seconds as she struggled to get air into her lungs.
Angel took advantage of that to pull her hands over her head and fully pin her down, using his legs to hold hers still. When she tried to buck him off, she could feel his erection pressing into her crotch and she recoiled reflexively.
“Oh,” he snarled, “the virtuous little bitch doesn’t like that, eh? Maybe before I kill you, I’ll have to pop that cherry you’re so proud of.”
“Too late,” she snarled back as she bashed her forehead into his face and tried to pull her arms free. She cursed her sixteen year old self for the baby fat coating the body that had become taut with muscle in her own time. She knew that if she was in her own body she would have been able to overpower the large vampire, but in this body she felt more helpless than she had in years.
While Spike was busy trying to contain a shrieking, struggling Drusilla, Angel bared his fangs and prepared to sink them into Buffy’s exposed neck. Just as he reached for her throat, the marks on it flared into visibility and Buffy could feel them emitting some sort of power. The snarling vampire recoiled in fear and astonishment as Spike’s claim became visible, allowing Buffy to free one hand and use it to push his head back far enough for her to wriggle out from under him. She rolled to her feet and fell into a fighting stance as he gaped at her
“You…you’ve been claimed! How…who…no one claims a Slayer.” His surprise was replaced with anger, “No vampire claims what’s mine. I’ll kill you and him.” He advanced on the slayer, snarling the whole time. “Tell me who it was. Did you stake him for it, or do I get to rip his head off?”
Surprised that he couldn’t tell that the tiny marks belonged to Spike, Buffy breathed a sigh of relief that she could feel was echoed by the the vamp still wrestling with Drusilla. The dark vampiress was shrieking about spells and witches and gypsies and tearing at Spike with her nails and teeth in an effort to break loose and attack Willow and Jenny.
Buffy couldn’t risk taking her eyes off Angelus long enough to watch the seer, and she prayed that Spike would be able to control her while she kept the fuming master vampire busy. When he charged her again, she was ready for him and leaped over his head, kicking him as she did so. She whirled and planted another kick in his back, sending him to the floor hard enough to stun him. When she didn’t follow up with a stake in his back, he staggered back to his feet with a knowing smile.
“You can’t kill me, can you, lover? I knew you couldn’t. It would break your little teen-aged heart.”
He stalked toward her, only to be met with a flurry of punches and kicks that put him back on the floor, bruised and bleeding, but undusted. He sat there, blinking up at her angrily.
“Give it up, Buffy. Admit it. You. Can’t. Kill. Me. You love me too much.”
Buffy rolled her eyes at his arrogance and spat back at him, “I can kill you, if I have to. News flash, Angel, I already have. Sent you right to hell, in spite of how much I loved you. And, Angel? This time around? I don’t think I even like you very much.”
“Then why haven’t you…” His face showed his sudden understanding and he leapt to his feet with a roar. “Where are they? You’re stalling me! Trying to put that miserable soul back. I don’t want it, Slayer. I won’t go back to being what I was.”
Buffy positioned herself between the furious vampire and the large piece of machinery behind which Willow and Jenny were frantically chanting, trying to finish their combined spells before Buffy had to stake him.
Angel’s roar had distracted Spike long enough for Drusilla to break free and she flew across the big room to where the chanting was almost ready to take her daddy away again. Buffy turned to run toward Drusilla and Angel tackled her to the floor once again. This time he wasted no time on threats or taunting, just reached toward her nearest body part with his fangs. Spike was frozen in place for a fraction of a second, torn between saving Buffy and saving the two chanting women.
When Willow screamed, he crossed the floor in two leaps, tackling Drusilla away from the shrinking red head. Before the spitting, hissing vampire could rip into him again with her claws, he brought his fist up and with a soft, “Sorry, luv,” he connected a hard uppercut to her chin that knocked her unconscious. He gave Willow and Jenny and apologetic shrug, then whirled to help Buffy, only to find the Slayer kicking his grandsire’s semi-conscious body all over the room.
“If,” smack! “you,” whump! “don’t stop,” crack! “trying to bit me,” bam!, “I’m going to stake you anyway and the hell with your freakin’ redemption!”
He grinned in admiration as she punched and pummeled the large vampire until she could drag his unconscious body up to where Willow and Jenny were finishing their interrupted spell casting. She dropped him in front of the frightened women, put her hands on her hips and said, “Well?”
“Done!” Willow said, sagging with relief. Jenny nodded her head and they all turned to watch Angelus’ body stiffen and shake as the spell hit him and his soul was restored. Turning from the now-groaning vampire, Buffy looked from Spike to the still unconscious Drusilla. She reached a tentative hand toward his bleeding face which was covered in cuts from his lover’s claws.
He flinched back away from her hand and cringed at the pain that flashed across her face.
“We need to go, Slayer. She’s gonna be really brassed off when she wakes up. Better if we’re on our way to South America by then.” The two blonds stared at each other for what seemed like forever before he said, softly, “I’m sorry, Buffy. I wish it could be different.”
She nodded silently, afraid to trust her voice as he lifted the limp vampiress to his shoulder and turned to go.
“Take care of yourself, luv,” he said as he walked out of the building without looking back.
“You too, Spike,” she whispered almost to herself. “Come back to me.”
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