Atonement
by Murray
Chapter 1
A figure stepped out of the shadows as the bleached blonde vampire walked out of sight. The small petite figure watched in awe at what had just happened and shook her head in confusion. "Spike." She said softly her own heart feeling like it had just skipped a beat. Her mind made up she headed towards home.
Her thoughts confused as she pondered what she had seen. Spike back home and able to hurt a human. That in itself was enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck but what was really confusing her at the moment was the question of why did he not kill him? "Stupid vampire!" She muttered under her breath as she continued on her way home. So caught up in her thoughts she didn't even hear or sense her once mortal enemy following her.
He knew she was there he could smell her unique Buffy scent of vanilla. His heart nearly leaped out of his chest when he sensed her. After telling the biker to run, he headed towards his crypt to think and plan his next move. That was his intent until he sensed her. He could feel her eyes upon him and he had to get out of there so he headed to the only home he knew, his crypt. He almost made it there too. But the part of him that loved her with all his heart would not let his legs continue in that direction. Instead he found himself doubling back until he was some 75 yards behind her.
He knew she knew he was back and yet, he was hiding. Afraid to confront her, afraid she would tell him to go away and never come back. So when he heard her call him a stupid vampire all he could do was agree with her. He was a stupid vampire, here he had everything he could ever have wanted in this unlife and he had turned it into shit. In his selfish way he had almost raped the woman he loved, thinking that would be what she really wanted. As insane as he knew he was when he tried to take her in her bathroom. He thought she was doing what she always did, deny him and herself what she had wanted all along. Him. God he could not believe he had tried to do that. She deserved better then him and still he could not give her up. While she deserved better then what he once was he needed her as much or even more then the air that he now breathed.
Ever since the near rape he knew he had to make it right. That was, after all, the reason for his trip to Africa and his confrontation with the demon. Spike knew two things. One he had to change in order to give Buffy what she deserved and two, he had to make her see he would never hurt her again.
While he had always felt emotions strongly now he was experiencing guilt. That pain was perhaps the worst pain he could possible feel. His soul was at war with his demon and somehow he was going to learn to control it. He felt bad for all the lives he had taken over his 120 years as a vampire and then if he was to examine his feelings honestly. He knew all those lives he had taken were what had kept him alive. For without the blood of the living he would have perished and his demon was not going to allow that.
Again unbidden his thoughts returned to the bathroom and he found himself hurting her in his need for her. So self-centre was he that he could not even tell she was hurt, though in retrospect he knew that was the case. She begged him to stop and all that did was fuel his demon further, fuel himself further to take what he wanted, never thinking about what she truly wanted. By time her pleading finally registered in his think brain, it was too late he had destroyed any trust he had built with her. In a moment of selfish need he had taken away that which he had built with her over the course of the last few years. "I really am a stupid vampire." He said out loud as he almost walked right into her, so lost in his own thoughts was he that he had no idea he was that close to her.
She stood before him her hands balled up and on her hips. Her face tilted slightly to the left. Her face-flushed red with unresolved anger at this man, this demon, that had dared do that to her. Even through all this a part of her rejoiced in the fact that he had come back home.
He swallowed and inhaled deeply as he looked at her, his heart racing a mile a minute. He was once again scared to death of this little blonde that held his now beating heart in her hand. "Buffy, I."
She didn't even let him finish, "You got the chip removed didn't you? I saw what you did to that biker outside of Willy's. You hurt him, but then you let him go. Why?"
Cor, she was beautiful; everything he ever wanted was before him, this blonde petite bundle of energy. He loved her so much and all he could do was stare at her. His blue eyes locked into her hazel ones, again he found himself drowning in her. It was all he could do not to try to reach out and touch her. The scent of vanilla washed over him as she moved into his personal space and he did something un-Spike like at that same instant. He stepped back.
Her nostrils flared as his scent assaulted her, she inhaled the smell of tobacco and even the faint traces of leather. Fighting with herself to go to him and hug him to her. To convince herself he was real she said to him quietly, "Why Spike? Why did you let him go? I saw what he did he hurt you."
"I didn't want to hurt him."
"But you could have?"
"Yes, I could have." He took a deep breath and did the only think he could do, took the only option available to him, he spoke the truth. Fear showing through blue eyes as he spoke his voice full of compassion, "Slayer. Buffy." His over whelming need to reach out and touch her became to great as he tried to talk, emotion so thick he felt like he was choking. He moved a step towards her and her initial reaction caused her to take a step back. Feeling her discomfort he continued, "I am so sorry I hurt you. I know you must hate me, but you have to know. I understand now. I finally get it."
Her eyes reflected her own emotional state as she reflected on the scene that had gone on before her, a part of her screamed it made no sense and part of her wanted it to be true. Two parts of the whole warring with one another, on the one hand she had every right to hate him. He had hurt her in a way no one had ever hurt her before, but then he was evil wasn't he? She thought again, *"Wasn't he?"* The other part of her loved him and needed him more then she knew one could need or love another. There in lied the problem her duel self in the past always getting in the way,
Not for the first time since he left she wondered if she had ever given him a chance. She wondered if she had ever really known him. God, she so wanted to know him. She so wanted to trust him. She was in such pain and she knew with out a shadow of a doubt he was in pain himself and there in laid the problem, he was evil he should not be feeling pain. *"Should he?"* She asked herself. All this flashed through her mind in two seconds. She put that line of self-doubt on hold and asked in a voice filled with wonder, "What do you get?"
"Buffy, I hurt you in a way that no one should ever have to experience pain. I thought that I could force you to love me. I love you so much it hurts. To think of spending my life without you makes me want to crawl away and wait for the sun to rise." Tears came unbidden to his eyes as he continued, "I am sorry I hurt you Buffy Summers. I want you to forgive me so much, but I know you and I can't go back to what we were. I see that now."
She looked at him with her mouth slightly agape as he spoke and his words sunk in. "Spike, what happened to you? You're acting almost."
He finished the sentence for her, "Human, soulful? God, but I am such a pathetic poof." He stood frozen to the spot his eyes locked with her own his own pain mirroring hers and for the first time in his life he had no idea how to fix something he wanted so badly. Taking was no longer an option for him. "I need to go Buffy. I can't do this now. Just know I came back to make things right. I came back to give you what you need. I will never hurt you again, Slayer. Please, believe that. I am sorry for all the pain I have caused in the past and if you let me I will prove it to you. I just need you to give me one chance. Can you do that?"
As she listened to him something nagged at the back of her mind, if she was not so overwhelmed with what she had witnessed and what he was saying she would have realized she could hear his heart beating and the sound of his lungs pulling in much needed air, but for now that fact was lost on her.
She stood there looking into his blue eyes wanting so badly to throw herself into his arms and forgive him, forgive herself for forcing it to go as far as it went. She felt partly responsible for his almost raping her. She forced her thoughts away from that path and concentrated on guilt and pain emanating off the bleached blonde vampire before her, finally she spoke in a small voice. "I. don't know if I can do that Spike. You hurt me so much. I just don't know if I can trust you again. I should just stake you now and be done with it. You know that and I know that and yet, we both know I can't. You don't even have a chip anymore, how do I trust you to do what is right when there is nothing to control you any longer?"
He took a slow step towards her and without seeming to move at all he took her left hand and laid it palm flat over his beating heart and said to her, "Sometimes, Buffy, you have to just trust in what your heart tells you and forget everything else."
Her eyes went wide as she felt his heart beating and for the first time ever she felt his chest rise and fall with each breath he took. Part of her screamed out this was a trick and part of her the part that loved him. The part that had always known she loved him, cried in silent wonder and joy and all she could ask was, "How?"