*hugs* and thanks to spikeslovebite for her awesome beta'ing!
Chapter 2 ~ Passion
Buffy felt him the moment he strolled into the library. She was alone; the others had long since gone home and Giles, knowing that Buffy still wasn’t comfortable around the woman, had left to confirm the possibility of a spell with Jenny.
The vampire sat down beside her, turning the chair around to sit astride it. He searched her face, waiting to be acknowledged.
“He was in my room last night,” she said softly, lifting shadowed green eyes to meet his gaze.
“So I heard. You alright?” His scanned her body looking for injuries. He didn’t expect to find any, knowing that most of Angelus’ victim bore their scars on the inside, but he still gave her a quick once-over.
“Yeah, just kind of shook up. Giles is trying to find a disinvite spell. He’ll be right back; he thinks he’s found one that might work.”
“Right. Speaking of invites; you know you lot are sitting ducks here, right? Any vamp can just stroll on in and have a field day.”
“Actually, I hadn’t really thought about it. Most vamps don’t come to the school at night. No action.” He grinned unrepentantly at her pointed glare. “They mostly hang out at the Bronze or lurk in dark alleys, waiting for easy meals.”
“Yeah, well, Angelus isn’t ‘most vamps’.” His expression hardened. “Dru had a vision. Don’t rightly know what it means, but she was wailing about an old enemy coming to destroy our happy home. I was kind of hoping you lot might have a clue who she’s rambling about.”
She chewed her lip as she digested this new information. “An old enemy, huh? Like maybe the gypsy’s that cursed Angel in the first place?”
He raised his eyebrow in question.
“Jenny’s a teacher here. She’s the one Giles went to talk to. She was sent here to keep an eye on Angel, to make sure he was suffering. She and Giles were sort of…involved.”
“Piss poor job she did keepin’ an eye on the poofter. They’ll go after her, you know? If they feel she’s a threat, Angelus will want to take her out quickly. He’ll wait ‘til she’s vulnerable and strike. He won’t take you head-on. He knows you’re as strong or stronger than him, so he won’t take foolish chances. But one teacher- even a gypsy- against him? It’s like child’s play. He’ll kill her and then use her death to taunt you. It’s his way. I’ve seen it too many bloody times.”
“You’re right. I-I didn’t even think about that.” Buffy shifted uncomfortably and bit her lip. “I’ve been sitting here trying to think of a way to tell my mom why she needs to stay in at night and not invite anyone in. God, she’s going to either think I’m crazy again or not take me seriously and end up getting killed. Every time I think things can’t get any worse, there’s an extra scoop of crappiness added to my life.”
“Pretty big on the visuals, aren’t you, pet?” Spike chuckled softly, hoping to tease her out of her funk. The last thing he needed now was a slayer who was too depressed to fight.
“You should try a slayer dream if you want visuals,” she scoffed. “We’re talking living color and surround sound. It’s way freaky.”
“You really get those?” He realized his enthusiasm was a little too close to his inner William for his liking and he tried to cover as quickly as possible. “I mean; I’ve heard about slayers having prophetic dreams. I just thought they were a myth.”
“I wish. Dreaming about your own death is not on the top of Buffy’s list of favorite things to do.”
“I imagine not, pet.” Spike turned away and snorted as the watcher entered the library, he nose buried inside one of his dusty tomes. He swung around to smirk at the slayer before facing the older man and shouting, “Oi, Watcher!” He couldn’t help the deep throaty chuckle as Rupert fumbled the book before catching it against his chest and breathing heavily.
“Was that completely necessary?” the startled man huffed, straightening his glasses as he glared at the pair of blondes laughing at his expense.
“I don’t know; it seemed to lighten the mood around here. What do you think, luv?”
“It brightened my night. Of course, lately anything short of an apocalypse would be better than most of my nights,” Buffy pouted.
Giles looked pained. “Not a statement one should make when living on the Hellmouth.” Noting his slayers suitably chastised look, he turned to the vampire. “Right, do you have anything new to report, Spike?”
“As a matter of fact, I do. I was just filling the slayer here in on a new development,” the vampire replied.
“Yeah, we may have a problem, Giles. Drusilla had a vision. Apparently an old enemy comes to take her daddy away, and we were thinking it might have something to do with Miss Calendar and her family.”
“Oh, um, right. She’s still in the computer lab; I’ll go down and tell her it might be best if she moves her research to a safer location until the Angelus situation is resolved.”
“She might want to take anything with her she needs, no staying anywhere after dark and especially not alone, even for a moment. Once he figures out who his target is, the Poofter will have minions watching and waiting. He’s not above sending in others to do his dirty work. Bloody cowardly, if you ask me.”
They watched Giles’ face as the information clicked into place and realization dawned. His expression showed his fear for the woman he had recently distanced himself from, both of what could have been and what could still come to pass.
“I’ll walk you down to get her, and then we’ll make sure she gets home safe,” Buffy offered grudgingly. She was still pissed about the teachers withholding of vital information, but that didn’t mean she wanted to see her dead.
“They’ll be busy tonight. Dru said she’d have to consult other sources to unravel the vision, or some such rot, and Angelus is trailing along behind her, afraid he’ll miss something if she gets too far away from him. I don’t think they’ll be ready to strike tonight, or even know who they’re looking for just yet, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
Buffy was surprised when Spike fell in step beside her on the way down the hallway. It was sort of comforting not being the only strong one, even if she was still wary of his motives. She tried not to take to much enjoyment from the teachers’ fright, as she dismantled her computer and packed away the smaller pieces.
Before long they were walking down the sidewalk, Spike carried the monitor while Buffy hoisted the main unit. Miss Calendar and Giles walked behind them, the watcher awkwardly trying to balance his crossbow and a box of computer accessories and the brunette gypsy carrying her satchel of papers as she clutched her stake in a death grip.
“Did you ever think this is what you’d be doing when you first crashed into town?” Buffy glanced sideways at the vampire, taking in his profile bathed in moonlight. The silvery light gave him an otherworldly hue. Duh, Buffy. He’s a demon.
“No, but it’s better than sitting around listening to the Poofter and Dru shag themselves to death.” He cringed, realizing too late his mistake. He turned to see her eyes fill with tears.
“Oh.” She paused for a moment as grief washed over her anew from the loss of her first lover. That he had turned so quickly to a new- or actually, an old lover- was more than her fragile heart could stand.
“Sorry, pet. Didn’t mean to upset you. I’m a bad rude man.” The vampire couldn’t believe his instinctual need to comfort this girl. He tried to tell himself it was only because he was feeling the betrayal as well that caused him to react to her pain.
“It can’t be easy for you, either. Me and Angel were only together for a little while, but you and Dru…I mean; a century, wow.” Her awe was genuine. After witnessing the downfall of her parents’ marriage and her own miserable attempt at happiness, the fact that he was capable of over a century of love and devotion was astonishing.
Drusilla is a fool, Buffy thought bitterly. To have someone that loved her that much, but toss it all away for a monster that seems unable to care for anyone other than himself.
“Yeah, well, it wasn’t all wine and roses. We had our ups and downs, and she always loved her daddy best. It’s how he made her. It just hits hard, you know? After so many years, you forget how things really are sometimes.” He tried to laugh away his comments, to hide how much his sire’s betrayal from had hurt him, but he knew that even after all these years, he still wore his heart on his sleeve.
Buffy watched his struggle and her heart ached, not only for herself, but for the supposedly soulless demon beside her. His expression was one of such misery that it couldn’t be mistaken for anything else. “Yeah, well, I don’t think Angelus is going to let me forget anything anytime soon. He seems to enjoy throwing it in my face every chance he gets.”
“That’s how he gets his jollies, luv. Try not to let him get to you. He’ll use it to his advantage and try to throw you off your game. Don’t let him see how much he’s hurting you.” Spike vowed he would get Angelus for all that he had done. He would pay for all he had taken from himself and this wisp of a girl, a girl who had done nothing more to earn her misery than to have the misfortune to love the wrong person.
“That’s easier said than done.” She avoided his eyes as they cut across the lawn to the little white house that occupied the corner lot.
*****
Buffy watched on the porch as the door closed behind her, waiting for the final clicks to ensure that the older couple was as secure as they were going to get. The watcher had decided to stay through the night to ensure that Angelus didn’t attack before anticipated. Although Spike had assured them that Dru hadn’t received all the details with her vision, it had done little to alleviate their fear for her safety, especially from the older man who had been so thoroughly captivated by the dark Gypsy such a short time ago.
Buffy thought that maybe she and the estranged woman needed to have a chat before much longer. She hated that Giles was suffering because his guilty need to stand by her side. She had learned the hard way that love wasn’t something that should be taken for granted. Sometimes you had to grab a hold of it with both hands and hold on tight, because you never knew when it would be wrenched from you and trampled into dust. God, Spike’s right I am big with the imagery.
Slowly, she and the vampire who had reluctantly been forced to join in their fight made their way to Revello Drive. She still hadn’t figured out how she was going to explain to her mother about the dangers of inviting in people after dark. Not without sounding insane or giving away too much information about her calling, which would land her back in the ‘sounding insane’ column.
Buffy opened her mouth several times to break the silence on the way to her house. She had so many questions she wanted to ask, some that she was sure he wouldn’t answer and a few she wasn’t sure she even wanted to know the answer to. Finally, she settled on a asking a simple question. “Aren’t you afraid to be seen with me? I mean, you don’t want it known that you’re helping us. That’s the plan, right?”
“The Great Git has given specific instructions to all the minions. They’re to steer a clear path around you, pet. He’s even restricted their hunting grounds to make sure they don’t get anywhere in your vicinity. As far as the Poof is concerned, you and yours are his to torture and torment, or to kill, if and when he deems necessary. Plus, I’m old enough that I can sense when other vamps are about. If I think one is near, I’ll disappear right quick.”
“What about Angel? I mean, Angelus. What if he comes around?”
“Well, as much as I hate him, Angelus is family. You tend to recognize family even faster than minions. Trust me, Angelus is so bleedin’ busy trying to decipher Dru’s vision he won’t be out tonight. You can bet he’ll do all he can to cover his own ass before he resumes his fun.”
They had finally made it to her house and she stood there, intensely uncomfortable and fidgeting with the hem of her shirt. “Well, thanks for walking me home.” She blushed under his smirking gaze.
“What? No good night kiss? Just the other night you were demanding my affection and tonight it’s the cold shoulder. I’m hurt, luv. Makes a poor vamp feel used.” He pouted mockingly; glad to bring a smile to her face.
“Ha, ha, Spike. Very funny. As much as this reminds me of one of my not so spectacular attempts at a normal life, this was not a date. Although,” she said with a self-deprecating little grin. “Technically this went a lot better than my last official dating disaster.”
“The Poof?”
“No, it was right before Angel. I tried to go the normal guy route and it didn’t work out so well. Me and Angel, we didn’t do the whole ‘dating’ thing with actual dates. It was more of a ‘show up, give cryptic info, and slink back off into the night’ thing.”
“He always did have a stick up his ass, soul or no soul.” Spike’s upper lip curled in disdain. “Always going on and on about having a passion for the kill. Bastard didn’t have a passion for the kill; he had an unquenchable desire to torment and torture. He had to drive them all insane before he killed them. Nothing but playing with your food, is what that is.”
“Okay, we’re putting that in the too much information file and closing the drawer.” Buffy shuddered at the images that flashed in her mind at his casual descriptions.
“Sorry, pet. I’m used to talking to myself, so I tend to forget who I’m talking to sometimes. Not like I want to talk to the minions, but if I do and don’t want it repeated, I just dust ‘em. It makes for a good confidentiality policy and lets ‘em know where they stand.”
Rolling her eyes, she replied with mock seriousness. “Yeah, never know when you’re going to need a good policy. Maybe the minions should form a union against the master vamps or something? No staking without representation and all that.”
“You want them to unionize or stage a revolution?” he chucked at her perplexed expression. He had to wonder if she was as ditzy as she led everyone to believe, or if she had played the part so long it was now just second nature.
“Um, is that a trick question, because that sound like one of those train traveling east questions on my math tests, and I never get those right.”
Spike shook his head. He was pretty sure now that he was being played. No one with as quick a wit as the slayer could be this dim. If he had more time to delve deeper into her inner workings, he was sure he’d find a bright and knowledgeable girl, but he had Dru and Angelus to worry about and time was running short. The formally brooding poof was growing more erratic all the time. Soon, it would be time for them to strike, to take the bastard down, get his princess back, and ride the hell out of Dodge.
“No, pet. No trick questions. I think there’s enough tricks and deceit going around without us adding to it, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, you’re right and I do trust you. Not in the ‘please-come-bite-me’ kind of way, but the ‘I-don’t-think-you-would-lie-to-me’ kind. I mean, even when we were trying to kill each other, we didn’t lie to each other.” She narrowed her eyes at him playfully. “Well, except for your delusions that you could ever take me on and win,” she snickered as she danced out of arms reach and up the stairs to lean on the porch railing.
“Please!” Spike snorted. “I think the same could go for you as well, kitten.”
He backed away slowly, already starting to blend in with the shadows as he ran his hand down his chest, stopping suggestively at the buckle of his jeans. “You just keep telling yourself it’s our well matched fighting styles and not your burning desire to test out my other ‘manly’ abilities that’s kept you from staking me so far.”
Buffy’s jaw dropped and she sputtered as he finally melted completely into the darkness. “Yeah, right! Like I would…o-or would even want to!” The slayer huffed and whirled around, muttering to herself. “Stupid vampire always having to get in the last word.”
Even as she closed the door, she could hear his laughter in the distance.
Ugh! Evil!
TBC…
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