Part Three: There’s No Place Like Home
Let no one ever say that William the Bloody did not know how to make an entrance. He’d lived a hundred plus years and hadn’t a dull minute to show for it. Oh, there were plenty of instances where he found himself unspeakably bored; truly, it took very little to wear on his nerves. But keeping him happy was frighteningly simple: hunting, eating, shagging, telly, and hardly in that order.
The past few weeks had schooled him severely. His need to keep himself from following every instinctual impulse had become a game, more or less. Self-control was not a trait Spike practiced with frequency. He knew that forced distance would drive him insane—so insane that, for a brief period, he’d contemplated not returning at all. He didn’t want to defeat his Buffy lust, only to return and have it painfully rekindled right before she gave him the boot. It was a hasty, if not poorly constructed solution to the hole he had dug himself into. He knew the minute he walked away that his will would not be met, despite how he wished to put things behind him.
He was playing with fire, and that was something no self-respecting vampire should ever do. Something he should never have attempted—not if he cared to maintain a lick of who he was. Angel had crossed that bridge more than once, was likely dancing on it now. That was well and good for him. He enjoyed being the Slayer’s pathetic lapdog. Being the bloke who was there to give her everything, save a good rut.
That thought was more than unsettling.
Spike often wondered how it was for her. How long it had taken her to feel the first authentic taste of regret. And while he wished he could blame his own actions on the same, the only regret he had was that their first time together had been about anger. That he’d wanted to kill her but found fucking her was more therapeutic. That he’d inwardly cursed Drusilla for driving him to Buffy, and then cursed Buffy for allowing him near. Then he cursed himself for believing the falsified promise that he would take his taste and kill her before he became too addicted.
Granted, that didn’t explain why he opted not to. That was crossing the boundaries of forbidden territory, even more than had already been trespassed. He remembered well everything he told her. Everything he couldn’t keep away. Every painfully wankerish confession. Every sinful touch. Every rumble of mirth when he got her particularly angry, and the wealth of deliciously perverse thoughts that he’d wanted to act out over and over again.
Spike still didn’t know where everything had gone so bloody wrong. He had volunteered himself for the position after disposing of Kralik with every intention of killing her. A snap of the throat, a sample of blood, and a hearty return to Dru. It was all there. A carefully constructed, fool-proof plan. Trapping the Slayer when she was at her most vulnerable. Although the prospect of taking her out when she couldn’t fight back was one he didn’t necessarily advocate, desperate times called for desperate measures. It was that or risk the end of a relationship that had defined him for over a century. He had been more than furious. More than willing to rid the world of her. Ethics be damned.
He wanted to believe that confinement with Buffy for any period of time had the ability to reduce the Big Bad to such extraneous levels of poofterdom, but he’d been hers for a long time now. Everything he’d told her had been true.
And when exactly did a soulless, unwankerish vampire obtain a set of ethics, anyway? He should have jumped for joy at the prospect of her death, regardless of the circumstance. Whether she be at full strength or weakened for the delights of creatures such as he, even if the thought had never rested well with him. There was no fun in taking out a slayer when she couldn’t fight back. There was no thrill. There was no passion.
Everything had changed the minute he saw her. The instant he’d grabbed her wrist and pulled her flush against him. The instant he’d felt the heated power in his arms. He’d released his bloodlust almost instantly for just plain lust and allowed himself to slip into familiar banter. It’d felt, for everything, as though he had spent every day since his siring on this level with her. With Buffy. Talking with her. Laughing with her. His mind had provided the world and years worth of memories and sensibility didn’t exist.
Buffy was dangerous to him, and he was addicted to her. She’d risen to the challenge. She’d squirmed—ohhhh, delicious—and voiced her usual threats. She’d demanded motive and made him question his own. Then they had gotten trapped in that blasted panic room, and all thoughts of killing her had flown out the proverbial window.
Then again, that wasn’t exactly true, either. There had never been many thoughts of killing her. Well, at first there had been tons. Some with an unexpected adult rating and others without. Spike wasn’t entirely sure when his daytime musings drifted from sinfully brutal to just plain sinful. There had been no true sign to bring his unnatural craving to a head. And at first, that was all it was: a craving. A craving that quickly turned into obsession.
Then they had formed that unnatural alliance to bring down Angelus, and he’d been lost. He’d seen her for what she was that night, and God, she’d amazed him. And though it had taken him a while to realize it, he lived now only to see her light. To revel in her strength. He wanted to be the one she relied on when the world was ending. He wanted to play her hero, even when she didn’t need saving.
God, how bloody perverse was that?
Spike should have known that the way to confront the problem was not to place himself in a situation where his unnatural ethics would be put to the test. Everything had collapsed. Buffy had surrendered whatever sense of morality she thought she owed to herself. She’d given Spike a taste. He had felt her beneath him. Around him. Burning him. The flavor of her running delicious circles in his mouth. Oh God, it’d been corruption at its richest. He wasn’t sure who lost that night. Whose fall from grace merited the most punishment. Her willful embrace of the dark, or his submission to her blinding light.
Those last few hours with her had been different. Completely reversed from the spiteful, vindictive girl he had originally found himself trapped with. Buffy had laughed with him. Talked with him. Joked with him. Smiled at him. She had laid her head on his shoulder and allowed her defenses that final collapse. He could have killed her whenever he felt like it. He likely should have if he ever hoped to escape unscathed.
But that thought hurt more than he could tolerate. More than he wished to consider.
He’d stood outside her window the following night, and watched her watch him back. He’d fought the urge to climb up that tree that had played host to Angel on many a night and give her a proper goodbye. Instead, he’d managed to turn away with what little dignity he had left, and returned to the darkness as his feet turned to granite.
Spike had left Sunnydale and tried to burn the memory from his mind, despite the promise he felt dampen his heart and the knowledge of truth that tickled his tongue. But here he was, back in Sunnydale, because staying away from Buffy was impossible, especially now that he had had a taste. A sample of what he wanted. Nothing less could keep him satisfied.
It was wrong. It was more than wrong. No vampire should crave the Slayer like this. No vampire should want more, and definite not more than a simple fuck. Oh, if only it was that. He could live with that. That was tolerable. That was explainable. The need to feel her beside him with every wake was not. The need to make her smile as often as possible was not. The need to hold her when she was crying was definitely not. The need to keep her safe from all others was bloody insane.
He was insane. There was no other explanation. No other reason he’d crossed that treacherous line from lust to…he couldn’t even fathom the word. He hoped he never would.
Dreams weren’t enough to send him back. After all, he’d thrived on scandalous, X-Rated Buffy dreams months before Drusilla’s insane allegations drove him into the Slayer’s arms. No. It was simple realization. Driving down the highway one night, lost in his thoughts, and pushed to that fine edge of acknowledgment. Fuck what others thought. Fuck what Drusilla thought. Fuck everyone. He knew what he wanted for the first time—what he really wanted. He knew what he wanted with perfect clarity. He had told her that he was coming back, and he would. Buffy wanted him to come back. She’d told him so.
What if she had changed her mind? Only one way to find out…
The old Desoto had pulled the mother of all U-turns, tires screeching in a silent night before taking off heatedly back to Sunnydale. Spike had no idea how far he had driven before coming to the conclusion that there was no place for him but back. Life after the birthday-incident had been a series of booze, floozies, and more booze. Quick women that he hoped to drown her memory in. A desperate need to escape that had only made him miss her more.
Bloody rotten irony.
In truth, they’d only been separated for a few weeks. More than likely, not enough time had passed for her to decide whether or not she wanted him in her life. And even if a verdict had been reached, it was more prone to weigh toward the other side. After all, what self-respecting teenager would willfully abandon her first love? He wasn’t blind; he had seen the way she fawned and pawed over Angel. Hoping that he had a chance against realized soap-opera was nothing more than wishful thinking.
But Buffy had asked him to come back. She wanted him back. She’d needed time to herself; time to see if their night together had been more than a grudge fuck. That she wasn’t substituting him for Angel. That if she had some of her ever-blessed time, she could—
Figure out how to rip your heart out? Haven’t you had enough of that this year, mate?
There was too much to consider. He had tried running away and failed miserably. And he was back now. Back in Sunnydale; the place that didn’t know when to quit for the vampire that never stopped. A small grin tickled his lips at the thought, familiar shivers racing up his arms and down his back. The Hellmouth didn’t exactly have a skyline—not like Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, and all those other fun pit stops he had selected as favorites over the years—but there was something about it that felt natural. Something that felt like coming home.
William the Bloody and his entrances. He had to make them, even if no one was there to applaud his efforts. Therefore, an entrance would be made. A smashing, unforgettable, redundant, and likely expensive entrance. In keeping with the city’s tomfoolery and insistence on maintaining the annoyingly intact ‘Welcome To Sunnydale’ sign that sat exactly where it had upon every previous arrival.
He couldn’t help but drive through it again—he had known that miles in advance. The bloody sign was so annoyingly persistent, and didn’t look good there, anyway. He was doing the town a favor.
Spike grinned to himself and put the car in park, kicking the door open and inhaling the air that was inherently Buffy Summers.
Oh yes. This was why he had come back. Fool to think he could stay away.
A jovial smile crossed his lips, and he finally lit the cigarette that had been dangling between his lips for the last few miles. “Home sweet—”
Buggering interruptions.
“Good Lord. You ran right through that sign!” A small, stuffy British ponce was staring at him agape. As though the world and all its citizens depended on the lifecycle of a postered welcome mat. Spike hadn’t noticed him approach, but it didn’t really surprise him. “Do you have any idea how much the city spends to fund the replacements each month? How could you be so audaciously disrespectful? I have a right mind to—”
The bloke looked to be Rupert Giles’s mini-clone. Tweed, glasses…yeah, he had to be a watcher. A watcher that didn’t know a vampire—moreover didn’t know him when confronted face-to-face. Something that could be rectified very quickly…
His slayer’s golden face flashed before his eyes, and he sighed. Or not. Killing a watcher likely wasn’t the best way to get his girl’s attention. This was bleeding fantastic. Couldn’t kill him, and the stupid sod would probably go screaming to Buffy, which was something he didn’t need. He wanted to watch her before he made his appearance public.
Balls.
More to it than that, a traitorous voice whispered as the man waddled closer. You’re holdin’ back for an entirely different reason, aren’t you, you fairy ponce?
That thought was beyond enemy territory. It was in the middle of the sodding holding cell. He might as well stake himself before considering the implications. Another task he had avoided in the field of self-evaluation. Not now.
Of course, that didn’t mean he couldn’t knock the bastard off his feet. No harm, no foul.
“Mite rude to interrupt a bloke in the middle of a soliloquy, don’ you think?” His fist met the prat’s eye without further delay. “I was havin’ a moment.”
The man fell to a heap at the vampire’s feet, a pitiful sound escaping his lips. Must be the new one’s watcher. Two Chosen Birds, another crime against society, even if Kendra had been a pushover. If the new one was taking orders from this clown, she had to be more of the same.
Two slayers in one town—one fight and fuck, one to fight and kill. One would think he was being spoiled.
Like Buffy’ll let you off her sister in arms.
Still…it was a nice thought.
With a smile, Spike drew the cigarette away from his lips and exhaled slowly, a smile crossing his lips. “Now, where was I? Oh right…” A shiver of anticipation. There was no denying that rush. The explored need for power. He was looking forward to seeing Buffy again, regardless of circumstance. These next few days were going to be tremendously fun. “Home sweet home.”
Of course, that didn’t mean he would rush into things. Patience was not his strongest virtue, but he would have to exercise it now. He wasn’t about to go waltzing back unprepared. Oh no. There would be no waltzing. Not until he knew exactly what he was getting himself into.
Reservations aside as though they never were. Now that he was back, he couldn’t see what had driven him to leave in the first place.
He couldn’t wait to see her again.
Even if it was from a distance.
TBC
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