Disclaimer- I don't own any of the characters from BTVS or Angel, this is merely fan-fiction. Joss Whedon, WB and Fox own them. So please don't sue as I am not making any profit from this.
Rating- R max
Spoilers- Yes- season one to four BTVS, season one Angel
Feedback- Please email me at and say what you think. Thanks!
Time Zone- After season four, so Future
Note- Just so your reassured, I hate the character of Riley a lot. A true B/A shipper!
Teaser- Riley makes a very silly decision.

Part 1

"Could you sign here for me?" The delivery man asked Buffy Summers as he gave her the bouquet of white roses and pointed to where on the clip board he needed her signature.

Buffy was overwhelmed and slightly confused. The only person who had sent her flowers before had been her father and they normally came attached to some sort of excuse for his unavoidable absence during special occasions. The only other person who would send her flowers was Riley but then again she hadn't expected him to be this thoughtful. Sometimes she craved for the kind of relationships her friends had. Willow and Tara were very attentful to each other and even Xander was making an effort in his relationship with Anya. He did say she would be getting a surprise when she'd talked to him on the phone yesterday morning. Perhaps this was it.

The delivery man gave her a soft grin and walked back to his van.

"Hey, thanks!" Buffy called after him, eyes still drawn to the flowers.

She closed the door and walked into the kitchen. No occasion for this, maybe the card would explain. She had often heard her mother joke about the only times her father ever gave her mother flowers was when he had done something wrong. God she hoped Riley hadn't done anything like that. She turned it round to face her.

`ALL MY LOVE'

There was a drawing of a cartoony Angel underneath.

Huh? She immediately felt warm and fuzzy, but mentally snapped herself back into reality. Angel, as in her ex, was sending her flowers. It made her happier than she should have been, considering she had a boyfriend. Why had he sent them? Angel wasn't a flowers person. Angelus was, especially when he wanted to get at her, but this wasn't his style either. No, it was definitely Angel, it was his handwriting, and Buffy had a gut instinct Angelus wasn't back in town, she would have heard from Cordelia if something had happened. So why? And how did he expect her to react? What was the point?

She leaned over and inhaled the scent. Sweet. Nice. Buffy tried to work out what Angel was trying to achieve, but initially came up fruitless. Then she realised. He wanted to contact her about something but was feeling to awkward after all that had happened in the past few months. He was testing to see if it was alright to still keep in touch. She knew he was still uncomfortable about hitting her, but it wasn't entirely his fault, she had been just as bad. It couldn't be business work, he'd have come down to Sunnydale if `great danger' was on its way. So personal stuff. Hmmm.

Buffy was smug that she'd worked it all out from a bunch of flowers, just like the way she had worked out about Willow and Tara without having to be struck over the head with a mallet labelled 'Willow loves Tara'. But what was her move? Ring him? Visit him? Email him? Did he actually have an email address?

Her thoughts were interrupted by the door-bell again.

'Angel!'

She flew to the door and opened it, checking her reflection in the mirror on the way.

"Riley?"

Her boyfriend stood on the doorstep sheepishly and stepped in to kiss her.

"Hi honey" He syruped. "Surprise!"

Buffy returned his second kiss with a little more enthusiasm and tongue, but her mind was still elsewhere. As much as she loved Riley, she didn't like the way he crowded her. Coming here like this was so not what she wanted, especially seeing as Angel needed help and as she might have to get in touch with him.

"Did I surprise you?" Riley said, obviously excited.

"Sure, of course!" Buffy replied with a fake smile, "but you're supposed to be relaxing,back in Iowa?"

"I missed you, Buffy. I couldn't stand the thought of being there when you were here. It didn't make sense. So I've come to Sunnydale early, thought I'd spend the rest of the summer with you"

Riley was pressing against her, moving her further into the house towards the kitchen where the flowers were.

"That's...that's great, but where are you going to stay?"

"Here with you of course" Riley husked, slowly sliding his hand up her blouse .

Think, Buffy, think.

"Mom!" she shouted, confusing Riley enough to move his hand away and put three feet between them. "I don't think she'd like me having my boyfriend over all summer, it is her house too and it just wouldn't be fair"

"But you said yesterday that she's out of town for a while" was the quiet reply

"Oh, I did?" Buffy faltered

"Great then! She doesn't have to know!"

By now they were at the kitchen. Buffy subtly put her arms around her man and rocked him around so that he'd be facing away from the table. She moved him forward very slowly.

"I'm happy you're here" she said, reaching with her arms to pick up the flowers. She had to be careful not to let him see them. This was going to be tricky. Riley reacted to being leant on over the table

"It's great that we wanna get back to basics, but on your moms kitchen table?!"

"Ok" He added grabbing her.

Buffy reached for the flowers and tried to move them quietly, but they rustled.

"Ooh, flowers" said Riley, turning around. "I thought I could smell flowers"

"Yeah, well my mom loves them. A kind of apology to me for her having to leave for a bit" Buffy lied "Saying sorry with posies"

Riley nodded and decided to get his luggage in from the step outside. When he'd gone, Buffy turned back to the white roses that could cost her relationship with Riley if he worked out they were from the strong competition of an ex-boyfriend. 'When did the competition become strong?' she though to herself. Put them in water or put them in bin? Too late now, Riley had seen them. She snatched the card away and put the flowers in a funky blue jug and partly filled it with water. Ok, next problem to deal with: Tear up the message or hold on to it for reference? She folded the card and put it in her back jean pocket.

Riley re-entered and pulled her into another hug.

"You've missed some lovin'" Buffy commented, beginning to feel comfortable to be back with her boyfriend for the first time since he'd arrived.

Riley reached over and slyly put his hand into the pocket. He took out and opened up the message he had seen her hide and read it over Buffy's shoulder before returning it. She hadn't noticed as she was kissing his neck oblivious. Good.

Riley scowled. Angel. The man, correction - vampire that had beaten him to a bloody pulp and bewitched Buffy so easily that she'd forgive it anything, even nearly killing her boyfriend. Were they having an affair? No, Xander had nixed that theory by their no sex predicament that had spoiled the relationship in the first place. But there was a strong attraction between them, they were still bonded. Riley wished that Angel was dusted. Buffy would be able to move on, and Riley wouldn't have a distracted girlfriend hiding things from him. If only Angel was dusted... Riley's military mind formed a plan.

If Angel was dusted. Riley could do that. Secret visit to LA, no-one would know. Riley knew he couldn't beat him in combat, but he could easily use some weapons and do some damage. Operation Dead-Guy. He'd have to leave for the city that day, find some excuse to not get Buffys suspicions up.

Angel had killed many people over his life, Riley reasoned, so from that point of view he would be doing lots of innocents a favour as well as himself. And vampires shouldn't be around anyway. Nasty, viscous creatures. And Angel was already dead, Riley would simply be extending that fact to the other literal sense.

Simple. Angel disappears, all that's left is a pile of dust. And Riley keeps the girl.

He gently pulled Buffy upstairs for some quality make up time. He'd have to leave in the morning and he hadn't touched her in a while.

Part Two

The blue vampire had attacked her and began to rip her throat out, when Buffy felt herself being jolted awake.

She opened her tired eyes to meet Riley's, he was already dressed and sitting on her bed. Buffy glanced at the clock.

"Three AM!" She screeched at him. "I know I'm used to being up at all times, but this had better an apocalyptic crisis"

She knew it wasn't by his smug grin, so she turned to her side away from him and began to fake snore.

Riley shook her again, more gently this time.

"Sorry" he whispered "but it is important. To me, anyway"

Buffy faced him, now awake.

"What is it?" she asked

"I'm so sorry, Buffy. I need to go away for a few days. I just got a call on my mobile saying that I'm needed back for a bit. I never told anyone I was coming here, you see. Everyone's really mad at me so I promised to stay in Iowa for another week. You mad, sweetie?"

His grin had faded into puppy-dog expressions. Buffy tried to hold it, but she burst out laughing. Not because of his face but out of relief. She didn't want to tell him that, though.

Riley's smile re-emerged, thinking that his cute animal impression had softened the blow.

"No, I'm not mad. Disappointed, maybe. We'll make it up next week, though." Buffy replied with a sultry smile.

Riley gave her a slow kiss, picked up his luggage and left her bedroom with a wave. Buffy went back to sleep, but this time staking the blue vampire and then dancing on some graves.

She woke up three hours later feeling refreshed. That short excursion into `Riley land' was over for a while, so she could sort through her issues. And that meant heading up to LA to see Angel.

"I can do that" she hummed, gulping down some juice and heading to the laundry room.

Then she sighed. She'd forgotten that she'd promised to see Giles later that day. He needed her help on finding a K'narli demon that was hiding in Sunnydale. The demon was waiting for the full moon so it could go on a killing spree, and Buffy was the one intending to stop it. She didn't know why the moon was important, she was relying on Giles to find that out. The source that was giving him the lead had mysteriously disappeared, and it was taking him a long time to get any information about the demon at all, because he was waiting for a specific K'narli book to arrive. Typical. She'd have to wait.

But as she began putting her laundry into the washing machine, she couldn't get her mind away from Angel. He needed something, so it was only right that she should try and oblige. She emptied her jean pockets, laid the emergency cross she kept there on the table and put the washing into the machine, setting it. No, she had to go. If she could find and kill the demon within the next few days, it'd give her plenty of time to go to LA before Riley came back. This would probably be her last chance for a while to see Angel, after all. The washing machine started making whirring noises. Buffy was about to move when she realised she had left the card that came with her flowers in her jeans. The ones being washed at that very moment.

"Oh great!" she muttered to herself sarcastically. "What was the point of keeping it when I do things like that?"

She consoled herself in thinking it probably wouldn't have been useful anyway. But the angel piccie was so sweet, it was meant for her. She'd have traded the bouquet of white flowers in if she could get it back. Too late now, though.

Buffy headed out the door to Giles house. She needed a quick resolution to the K'narli situation soon. Maybe leaning on the ex Watcher would hurry him up. Maybe she could help with the book reading. And besides, she needed to talk to someone about this little situation she had gotten herself into.

*

Riley threw his cases onto the mobile bed and jived around the room. He'd done it, he'd successfully lied to Buffy at last. And it was such a bad excuse too. So much for Slayer sense. She certainly hadn't had much of that over the past few days.

He suddenly sobered, thinking now about `Operation Dead-guy' and what he needed to do to get his bounty. First, find where Angel's lair was. Buffy had said something about an agency once. Riley wished he'd been more forthcoming in those conversations and so would have known the name and address of that place. He could have been there and done it by now. He'd actually gone through a few of Buffy's drawers to try and find a business card, but had failed. He had a feeling it was in her wallet, but couldn't find that either. He did, however find some useful Vampire Slaying equipment in her room which would be useful. Holy water, crosses of all sizes and plenty of stakes. Riley also had access to thousands of old Initiative stuff which he had collected after leaving Buffys home. But he felt his best bet was with the cross-bow he had taken from Mr. Giles house. As a trained phantom of the Initiative, he did this with considerable ease, no-body had heard a sound as he stole it from the case of similar equipment.

Once Angel was located, Riley intended to survey its home for maybe a day or two, just to discover what the vampires life-style was and who his allies may be. By finding a weak spot, he would then infiltrate the lair, stake Angel without hesitation and leave. He could only do this when Angel was alone, so he would have to bide his time for the right moment. Riley was willing to change it, of course, but it was a solid plan for now.

Day was turning to dusk and he had a few things to do before the next day, so Riley decided to protect himself with anti-vampire garb before leaving in case some other demons wanted to party with him. He filled a watering can with the many vials of holy water he had taken and walked into the bathroom. He stripped, stood in the bath and held the watering can above his head. He poured the water all over himself- paying close attention to his neck.

"Bet no-ones thought of doing that" he said to himself. "Vampire repellent. Ask your local stockist for details."

Dressing in green colours that were not quite military yet not quite casual, he put a cross necklace around his neck and filled his pockets with stakes. The vamps were going to scream with terror when he started walking the streets!

He found the flower shop quite quickly. It was one of those international popular ones so it was still open when Riley got there.

"We're closing in a minute" said the disinterested young woman behind the counter.

"I'll only be a moment" he replied.

He dug in his pocket and retrieved the folded card that he'd taken from Buffy's jeans before he'd left.

"Can you help me find out who sent me a bouquet of white flowers yesterday? This came with them" he asked, offering the card.

The woman glanced at him, reached across the counter and took it.

"Cute drawing" she said

"I need an address" Riley added, opening his wallet, prepared to give her money. "It's important"

"Sorry" she answered, passing the card back. "I can't do that. Against `Lara Flower' policies."

Riley drummed his fingers on the counter, anxious. This was his main lead, if he failed to get the address of Angel from here, he'd have to resort to other tactics.

"You don't understand. I didn't come all this way to be stopped by you."

"I'm sorry - "

" - Here, take this" He said, passing her a small bundle of notes.

"I'm not sure." she said

"Look. There's a real reason why I need to find this person." He replied

Riley did his `puppy-dog' impression and gave a short sob story about lost love, surprise flowers, must find.

The woman bought it. Giving the money back, she searched her data- base for the sender, clapped her hands when she located it and wrote down the address.

"Thank-you" he said, squinting at the scruffy writing.

"I hope you find her. Angel seems to mean a lot to you" she said.

"Not for much longer" Riley muttered.

*

It actually didn't take too long to find `Angel Investigations'. Riley had laughed bitterly at the irony of the title of this business. If he knew the agency was named after the blood-sucker beforehand, he wouldn't have wasted so long at the florists. And what was this garbage about helping other people? Some sort of plan to make him look good for Buffy? Demons didn't help people. It just wasn't the point of being one.

It was night by then. It cloaked him against prying eyes, so he simply stood outside the building for a while thinking about Buffy and how she'd never know what he was going to do for her. As Angel ran a detective agency - for whatever reasons - he could go for the obvious `I have a monster after me please help' approach to get in there, storm up to Angel and shoot the bastard. Or he could just follow the vamp around for a bit and wait for an opportunity.

Like now.

Suddenly, a tall, black clothed figure emerged from the agency. He was coming towards Riley. The military man looked around for a place to hide but was too petrified to move. It had to be Angel. God, he should have come better prepared with that swifty cross- bow. He was far too unarmed to dust him there and then, and besides, Riley had real fear of this guy. At least he was protected from attack with the holy water, but what if it wasn't enough? The figure drew nearer and passed Riley by, who looked at his shoes to shield his face in case he was recognised. The attractive, dark- haired, brooding man stopped a few metres from where Riley was and looked around. Riley had just looked up too, and they almost made eye contact, but Riley quickly turned away and started walking in the opposite direction, preying.

It was Angel, of course it was. Riley had recognised the vampire instantly, but he was hoping that Angel hadn't recognised him too. He didn't want to walk with his back to the demon, what if he was jumped on by that ferocious killer? He wouldn't be able to protect himself very well. It was much safer to be shadow man for the moment than to blow his cover with an early confrontation.

When Riley had a sneaky peek behind him a few minutes later, he realised that he wasn't followed. He stood still. Damn, now he'd lost Angel for the night. A great opportunity lost. He retraced a few of his steps back to the agency, but it was all quiet. No-one was there.

Well, when one door closes, somewhere there is a window. Riley could use this time doing something else constructive.

He took out a pin from his pocket and headed for the building.

Part three

Riley cautiously glanced around the street and put the pin into the lock. He had a strong feeling that any second now, Angel would appear behind him, throw him across the road and rip his throat out for trying to get into the agency. This made him nervous, which led to some clumsyness when attempting to open the door. After a few tries, he heard a click, the door opened, and Riley thankfully crept in.

As he plodded around the office, Riley wondered where he should start snooping. Anything about Angels habits, weaknesses and plans would be so useful to him. He started with one of the desks. There was a picture of an attractive dark haired woman on it, and for a moment he thought Angel had a new girlfriend. Angel had a girlfriend?! For the first time, Riley thought he'd made a mistake in coming to LA. If Angel had a new honey, then Buffy would be left alone. No, the flowers. Don't forget the flowers. Of course the demon wanted Buffy back.

Riley opened a few of the desks' drawers and found his answer. This wasn't Angels desk. Unless the vampire had branched out into testing make-up as a side business. So this must be Cordelia's desk. From the little he knew, Angel worked with one of Buffys old friends. Riley had real trouble believing it was a detective agency, how 70's of them. He idly flicked through some papers he'd picked up from one of the lower drawers, trying to find something of use. He warily put them back and realised that he'd left a sweaty handprint on the top page, making some of the ink run. He swore to himself and picked it up again to see the damage. The writing was slightly smudged, but was still readable. `Not too bad,' he thought, and he silently thanked himself for not doing anything worse.

He hunted through the items on the desk, ignored the answering machine and turned his attention to the bottom drawer, Riley found a stake underneath some disks. Obviously he wasn't the only one to distrust Angel. The temptation to take it was too great, so he pocketed it and moved on. To the other desk. He opened the top drawer and found a schedule for the whole year. Glancing through, he noticed it was mainly empty. Either they didn't get many clients or those they did have rarely booked appointments. Finding the pages for that week, he was unsurprised to find that they too were mainly empty. There was one from a few days before that said `Send flowers- B', which was a pretty easy code to work out, but nothing coming up for the rest of the week. Oh well. It would have been a lot easier to know where Angel would be beforehand, but Riley knew that was wishful thinking. Plain old fashioned stalking would have to do.

Riley sat down on Angels chair. He was deep in thought, wondering what his next move would be. How would he kill him? This was never really considered in much detail. It wouldn't be the easy `walk in shoot him leave' scenario that he had originally envisioned. Lure him out into the day? The sun would dust him and Riley wouldn't have to fight. But Angel wasn't stupid, no self-respecting vampire would forget about the small factor of burning to a crisp by walking outside into the big sunny day. Then what if Riley lured him back to the agency one night and trapped him there until Riley made his big entrance and staked him? That'd work, but he'd have to ensure that nothing from the scene could be traced back to himself. Buffy wouldn't really understand if she found out the truth. And he was fairly sure that Angel had some evil vampire friends that would revenge his un-death. But the idea of making Angel wait before he turned to ash sounded sweet. Riley wanted to taunt that ( loosely termed) man the same way he had taunted Buffy when he was bad. Xander hadn't passed out much detail about it, but Riley had enough of a biography of this vampire that he'd want to stake him if Angel was hounding Professor Walsh, let alone his girlfriend.

Riley felt confident that he knew the layout of the agency well enough to be able to use it in his plans, but to be sure he found a piece of paper and pencil on Cornelia's desk and drew a sketch of it, including where the door and windows were. He looked at the windows, which had heavy curtains tacked over them. They would be useful.

Operation Dead-Guy was underway, but Riley needed lots of preparation before doing the deed. He quietly crept out of the door into the street. Clutching his piece of paper, he considered going back to the motel, but wasn't tired because he was too preoccupied. Instead of going to sleep, Riley headed into the night with his mind on training. His plan was built on brains, but he needed to be physically prepared as well just in case.

He took the stake out of his pocket and hunted for some out of hours vampires to slay. He had to perfect his technique within the next few days.

"Come on you blood-dependant wooses, I need some action. Its all for a good cause."

Riley's voice trembled with fear. Maybe he was a little rusty with his slaying techniques.

*

Giles still hadn't found the K'narli demon, and frankly, Buffy was worried. She had stayed in his house until the early afternoon trying to help him read all the books he had scattered around his house. There was little mention of the monster, but they were determined to find something of use.

"It's no use" her ex watcher had said for maybe the tenth time that day. "I need that book."

Buffy gave up with the thick volume resting on her lap and wandered around the house to stretch her legs. She was restless, preoccupied and fed-up. She really wanted to talk to someone about Angel and the flowers, but somehow it didn't seem right to burden Giles with her issues.

Buffy walked over to Giles weapons cabinet and opened it, wondering which lucky weapon would kill this demon when they'd located it.

God, time was really running out here. With every hour, her yearning for Angel was growing stronger. If she didn't kill it that night, she'd be a wreck of worries and concern by the next day.

Angel had clouded her judgement once again and she had to see him before she totally lost herself in confusion. She picked up a nifty arrow case and glanced through the equipment to find the cross-bow that the arrows were used for. That'd kill a demon, Buffy thought, although she'd never really had much luck with those `Flying Fatality's before. That was strange, the cross-bow wasn't there.

"Hey Buffy, Giles. What are you doing?" said a familiar voice. "Door was open, you shouldn't do that, even in day"

"Willow!"

Buffy ran over to her best friend and hugged her. The red-head became concerned.

"What wrong?" she asked

"Everything" Buffy told her.

Giles turned to them, knowing that Buffy had things on her mind, and that Willow was the best bet to discuss it with her.

"Have a break if you want, there's little point in all three of us wasting the day."

Buffy didn't want to, but at the same time she really needed to talk to some-one before she burst into flames. She dragged Willow from his house back to her own, telling Giles they'd be back in an hour.

"Nice flowers" Willow had said when they entered theSummer's kitchen and Buffy retrieved some juice.

"They're from Angel" was the quiet reply. "He needsme, I can feel it"

"Why?" asked Willow, surprised the `A' word had come up.

"I don't know. I need to see him, but this stupid `karate' demon needs killing before the week-end's full moon so I have to wait. I can't just up and leave."

"I'm sure Angel would understand, I mean, aren't you doing the no contact thing?"

"So why did he give me flowers? What's he trying to achieve? I don't need this stress." moaned Buffy, hitting her head on the table a couple of times.

She suddenly stopped and looked back up. "Oh yeah, get this. Riley decided to set up home here until the end of the holidays. I didn't need that stress either"

Willow nervously looked around.

"He's not here" Buffy added, noticing Willows reaction. "Had to go back to Iowa for another week. He'd jumped the gun a bit by coming back so soon. So you see why I only have a week to see Angel now too"

Willow understood perfectly. Buffy would never have the freedom to go up to LA when Riley came back, her boyfriend wasn't exactly happy about Angel since he was beaten up. And it would look strange if Buffy suddenly went up there to see the ex for a chat when Riley knew that Buffy was once madly in love with the guy. So one week to see Angel, one week to find and kill the demon. Can't combine both.

Buffys eyes suddenly lit up. "Will, you can help me"

"How?"

"I go up to LA tonight, and when Giles finds the demon, you can bind it in its hiding place until I come back and kick the life out of it. What do you say?"

"I can't. Sorry, Buffy, I just don't have the power yet. What if it goes wrong? I wouldn't be able to fix it" she replied

"But Tara can help you. Please, Will. I need to see him" Buffy pleaded.

There was a few seconds silence as something dawned on Willow.

"You're still in love with Angel!" she exclaimed.

Buffy sharply turned to look at her.

Go to Part Four