He saw her before she saw him, standing in the doorway waiting for him, watching the people on the dance floor as her own body swayed gently to the music.  All thoughts of what had happened in the alley vanished as Spike paused, slipping into the shadow of the wall so that he could watch her undetected, blending into the darkness even as his skin and hair glowed from the ambient light.

She wanted more.  This sylph-like creature, rooted with a transient footing in both his world and hers, wanted him.  Needed him.  Her words.  Not his.  All he’d asked was that she vocalize them.  He never demanded that she place such labels on it; he’d only grown tired of the uncertainty of the whole thing and needed the definitive word from the Slayer on what just exactly was going on between them.

If she’d said it was just about the sex, that would’ve been fine.  Easier, even.  Especially considering the ramifications of what a more serious relationship would mean to her friends.  Briefly, Spike wondered if she’d thought about that yet.  For some reason, he wasn’t sure Rupert would be that upset.  Not thrilled, most definitely, but how many times had the vamp had to listen to that higher purpose lecture over the past few months?  The Watcher believed that he could be a fit within their dynamic, and for once, Spike was beginning to believe him.  A fit orchestrated by his relationship with Buffy.

Secretly, though, or honestly depending on how he looked at it, he was glad she wanted more.  Not for what seemed an eternity had his world made as much sense as it did when she was in it.  Grounding him.  Giving him direction.  Purpose, even.  Light into the darkness, if he wanted to wax all bleedin’ poetic about it.  His own feelings were a jumble, so he could only imagine what was going on through her head, but the possibility that he could love this stubborn, beautiful, infuriating, powerful woman loomed large on the horizon, and for once, he didn’t shy from what it offered.

Love the Slayer.

Yeah.  He could do that.

Hell, he was mostly there already.

He saw her gaze shift then, turning to look directly at him, and she smiled, giving him a little gesture with a toss of her head, indicating for him to come out of the shadows and join her at the door.  Automatically, Spike’s feet moved and the irony of his earlier thoughts did not go unforgotten.

Not ready to be at her beck and call, eh, mate? he thought as he sauntered to her side, his duster swirling gently around his legs.  She didn’t even have to say the words this time and you were right there.  So much for that so-called self-esteem you were so bound and determined to hold on to.

“I just remembered this little store I walked by,” she said as he approached.  “I’m pretty sure it was near where I got the gris gris.”  Her body tensed to turn, but something she saw in his face made her hesitate, a thin line appearing between her brows as the corner of her mouth lifted in confusion.  “What?” she asked.

He couldn’t help the hand that came up to cup her face, or the way his thumb stroked the arch of her cheekbone.  “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured, not caring how poncy he sounded.  Before she could respond, his head had lowered, his lips lightly brushing across hers, but even that most gentle of caresses sent a charge over his skin, igniting the pit inside him, driving his other hand to slide up over her ribcage.  His hand cupped her breast, and he could feel the hard bud of her nipple poking through the thin fabric, felt the heat rolling off her as his own skin soaked it up like a sponge.

Against his mouth, Buffy moaned, encouraging him to deepen the kiss.  When he tried though, Spike was surprised by her pulling away, and looked up to see the concern mired in the green.  “What?” it was his turn to ask.

Her fingers came up and trailed over the healing burns on his face.  “I’m worried about hurting you,” she said.

Spike smirked.  “You couldn’t have had that thought before you dropped an organ on my back?”

Her jaw dropped in surprise, and she pushed him away in mock-protest, taking care to avoid the burned side of his body.  “That was more than two years ago, you jerk.  And if you care to remember, you kind of had it coming.  ”

As she began to flounce away, Spike laughed and grabbed her around the waist, pulling her back against him.  “Love seein’ you like this,” he said, nuzzling his face into her hair before drawing his lips down the side of her neck.  “All fire and perky self-righteousness---.”

“Hey!”

“---and glowing from havin’ just been kissed makes a vamp go all a-quiver,” he finished, his voice muffled as his blunt teeth caught the lobe of her ear and tugged playfully.  He pressed his erection into her the curve of her ass, chuckling when he felt her heartbeat accelerate in response.  “But nothin’ warms these old cockles more than knowing you’re concerned for my welfare.”

He couldn’t see her face, but Buffy smiled anyway.  “Since when do cockles get hard when they’re heated?” she teased and slipped a hand behind her, between their bodies, to rub the length of his cock.

Spike growled at the touch.  “You do know those bloody burns stop from the waist down, right?” he said into her skin.  “We could forego that second sweep and just head on back to the hotel, you know.”  Her sigh within his arms, accompanied by the disappearance of her hand, told him her answer.  Not that it wasn’t what he was expecting.  Buffy wouldn’t want to give up until all her options were exhausted.  And if it took another look around the Quarter to do it, she would.

“There’s an ice machine at the hotel, right?” she asked lightly, grabbing to take his hand in hers even as she pulled away and headed through the entrance.  The look she shot him over her shoulder was sly.  “Maybe we can---.”

She was cut short by the looming figure of a large black man suddenly appearing before her on the sidewalk.  “I have been waiting,” he said.

“That right?” Spike said, head tilting as his blue eyes swept up and down the dark figure.  Bulging with muscles, bald as an eagle, with flashes of gold in his teeth to match the earring in his left ear.

And a pulse.

Damn.  The bloke was human.

“You have been searching for the Old One, have you not?”       The man’s black gaze settled on the hollow between Buffy’s breasts.  “You wear her charm, so I know you are the one.”

Buffy and Spike exchanged a look, both frowning at the odd words.  “I’ve been looking for someone---,” she said.

“The Old One,” he interrupted.

“She wasn’t really that old.”

He smiled.  “I refer to her soul, not her flesh.”

“Oh.”  The Slayer’s fingers strayed to the gris gris.  “How’d you know we were looking for her?”

“The inquiries of she who is Chosen and her vampire companion have been heard.  I’ve been sent to fetch you.”

“Guess stopping all those people paid off,” Buffy said, glancing up at Spike.  “Bet you’re feeling bad about giving me a hard time about it now, aren’t you?”

He rolled his eyes in response.  “Not bloody likely,” he said.  “Just remember how you felt when I was chattin’ up that bartender.”  He shoved his hands into his duster, staring at the man before them.  “Where is it you think you’re takin’ us?”

For the first time, the black man looked confused.  “I have said.  To the Old One.”

“Got that.  Meant the actual where, Mr. Clean.  As in location?  Don’t really fancy takin’ a trip halfway across the city just to scratch an itch about gettin’ my own gris gris if I don’t have to.”

“Oh.”  The man turned, pointing down the street.  “She waits at the store.  Two blocks down.”

Buffy’s playful slap of his arm caused Spike to wince as a stab of pain from his injury shot down his side.  “I knew we were close,” she said, suddenly excited. 

“No, you knew we were lost,” he countered, and just shook his head as he watched her fall quickly into step with their guide.  Not that he was bothered by this sudden turn of events.  Even if Spike couldn’t really do anything if things turned, Buffy could certainly hold her own with Tall, Dark, and Dangerous, and getting the charms on order now just meant getting the Slayer back to their new hotel room all that much quicker.

He grinned as he followed after the pair.  He’d show her that his little tricks back in the club were only the tip of the iceberg.

*************

The realization that they’d actually passed the tiny hole-in-the-wall shop at least twice in their sojourns through the French Quarter did not go unnoticed by Spike, but he held his tongue as they crossed the threshold, noting the touristy displays near the front of the shop segueing into the more eclectic as they penetrated the bowels of the building.  The air practically crackled with magic; it wouldn’t surprise the vampire if there was some type of spell on the place warding it from notice from unwanted visitors.  Buffy probably would never have been able to find it without some sort of outside aid.

They were led up a narrow stairwell, and their guide stopped at the top, knocking at the door that was there.  Muffled footsteps came from within, and it was quickly opened, revealing the fleshy outline of a very large black woman.  She wore a brightly colored sleeveless dress, as well as a bright smile, and Spike felt a quirk of amusement tug at his lips.  Someone who obviously had no qualms being comfortable with herself, he thought.

“Certainly took you long enough,” the woman said, stepping aside to allow the group entrance.

“And hello to you, too,” Buffy said as she slipped past her.

Slowly, Spike climbed the remaining steps, but hesitated at the uppermost, feeling the natural boundary holding him back.  Inside the apartment, Buffy glanced back once she realized he was no longer behind her, and he just shrugged, leaning against the jamb.

“Got no problems watchin’ from here,” he said.  “Not like I’m much use against this kind of mojo anyway.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed slightly as she met the vampire’s blue ones, probing even as her smile never dimmed.  “You’re Spike,” she said slowly, and her gaze slid to the burns on his face before following the path down the wounded side of his body, as if she could see the injuries beneath his clothing. 

Inadvertently, Spike stiffened under her scrutiny, feeling her eyes like a physical caress.    Now he understood why the Slayer had wigged out like she had.  The sway of the black woman’s magic rippled in the air between them, reaching out to search…something. 

No.  Not something. 

Him.

A flash of fear behind his eyes---what would she find?  Would he come up short?---left him feeling angrier than he expected, and he assumed his best Big Bad pose in an attempt to cut her investigations short. 

It didn’t change a thing, though.  Her black gaze remained amused, rapidly assessing him as it swept up and down, finally returning to the burns on his face.  She shook her head wryly.  “That wasn’t the kind of red I was talking about, darlin’.”

He frowned, shooting Buffy a curious look before turning back to their hostess.  “Sorry to disappoint.  Don’t s’pose you’d mind sharing what kind of red you had in mind then?”

Her laughter filled the stairwell.  “Well, now that wouldn’t be much fun, now would it?” she boomed.  “Now, get your skinny ass in here.  I don’t feel like standing here all night with all my bits hanging out.”

“Um, he has to be---.”

She cut Buffy off with a wave of her hand.  “I know he’s a vampire, child.  I wasn’t finished.  Consider yourself invited into my home, Spike.”

Tentatively, he straightened and stepped over the threshold, thumbs hooked into the waistband of his jeans as he came to a stop just inside the room.  It was just as bright as she was.  Garish throws of every hue covered the broken-down couch, while a huge mural was painted directly onto the walls around him, pictures of small brown children playing in a huge field making him feel very much like he’d suddenly stepped outdoors.  The bright green carpet didn’t help to dispel the notion.

In the corner, an empty birdcage hanging from the ceiling swung silently in minuscule circles as if caught in some invisible breeze.  It didn’t go unnoticed by Buffy, and Spike had to refrain from chuckling out loud when he saw her eyes widen, her hand automatically flying to the charm around her neck only to stop from actually touching it.  She’s goin’ to have bird nightmares for the next week, he thought in amusement. 

The woman motioned toward the sofa.  “Have a seat.  I’ve got some lemonade in the fridge if you’re thirsty, although…”  She stopped, looking between the two blonds, but as she opened her mouth to speak again, she shook her head.  “Don’t think anything I give you two is going to cool you down, now is it?”  She chuckled, waving again towards the furniture.  “Sit, sit.  I hate people who hover.  Vampires, too.”

Awkwardly, Buffy tried positioning herself on the edge of the cushion only to fall back into its plushness, the broken springs failing to support her.  “We won’t be here long,” she rushed, trying to cover up her clumsiness.  “We wanted to talk to you about the gris gris.”

“What’s there to talk about?  It worked, didn’t it?”

“Well, yeah, and thanks for that and everything, but---.”

“What the Slayer’s tryin’ not so gracefully to ask,” Spike interjected, perching himself on the arm of the couch, “is how do we go about gettin’ our hands on some more.”

“No!” Buffy argued.  “That’s not it!”  But under the direct gazes of both the vampire and their hostess, she faltered.  “OK, so maybe that’s partly it,” she admitted.  “But I also want to know why you did it.  Who are you?  What do you have to do with Sandrine?”

“I’m nobody, but you can call me Clara.  And I only did it because I happen to like this little corner of the world we live in.  I’m not that interested in seeing…what did you say her name was?”

“Sandrine.”

Clara shook her head.  “I kept getting tree imagery on her.  I don’t know why.”

“That’s because the bitch is currently inhabiting my best friend’s body.  Her name is Willow.”

“Ah, Willow…”  There was a moment of silence as the woman seemed to digest this information.  “She won’t be the one who weeps, though,” she finally said thoughtfully, not really focused on her guests surrounding her.

The two blonds waited for her to continue, but instead sat in an awkward quiet for several minutes.  “Looks like you were right about her bein’ all Delphian,” Spike finally commented with a lift of his eyebrow.

“Huh?”  Buffy looked up at him in confusion. 

The small exchange brought Clara back from her thoughts, and she joined in Spike’s flippant mood.  “I guess it’s a good thing she’s strong, huh?” she said to him conspiratorially.

“Hey!  Sitting right here!” the Slayer protested.  “And we found you, didn’t we?”

“Actually, Peter here found you,” Clara said, gesturing to the hulking figure of the bald man now leaning against the door.  “And I only sent him to fetch you because you were starting to attract the wrong sort of attention from all your questioning.  I like my privacy.  I thought it would be better this way.”

“So…you saw all this happening?”  Buffy inched forward on the cushion, keeping her balance this time, her face serious as she scrutinized the large woman.  “You saw Sandrine and me coming to New Orleans?”

“There have been rumblings for some time now, darlin’.  Creatures coming from the shadows to try their hand at getting things that don’t belong to them.  Stars screaming out their songs like tomorrow’s not on the schedule.  Now usually, me and my kind don’t bother getting involved.  These things always have a way of working out, one way or another.  Someone makes a mistake, or someone else steps up to the plate to put a stop to it.  The scales inevitably always get balanced.  But this time…”  Clara sighed, her lumbering frame shifting as she crossed the room to the window.

As she pulled aside the curtain, patterns from the moonlight filtered through the glass, and Spike frowned in contemplation as he saw the etchings along the top pane, symbols he didn’t recognize now cast in silver on the carpet.  They were wards, he realized, but against what he had no idea.

“…this time,” she was saying, “even the lwa are nervous.  They warned of Sandrine’s return, and when signs indicated that the Vampire Slayer would be arriving, I chose to do what I could to help.”  She glanced back to smile and wink at Buffy.  “You were very easy to lead to my store.”

“So do you see how this is all going to turn out?”  Buffy’s face was tight. 

Clara shook her head.  “There are many possible paths.  It…changes with the flow of time.  Auras shift as new developments arise.”  Her black eyes settled on Spike.  “Choices are made when doors are opened.  No matter what, though, the blood will flow.”

He flinched under her direct gaze, but said nothing.

“But you’re still willing to help, right?” Buffy insisted, rising to her feet and stepping toward the other woman.  “That’s why you gave me this gris gris.  You’ve got to be more powerful than Sandrine if this was able to protect me.”

“I’m not more powerful, child.  I wish I was.  I’d take care of the little witch myself.  Problem is, it’s not just her anymore.  She’s gained allies.  The vampire Iris stands by her now.”  She nodded toward Spike.  “Your intervention has introduced a new player that I did not see when I first offered my aid.”

“Some kind of seer you are,” Spike muttered.

She ignored his comment and turned back to the window, tracing the patterns on the glass with a thick finger.  “If the path that has been taken is completed, the serpent will rise again within a week’s time.  It can be defeated, of course, but I’m sure I don’t have to tell the Chosen One that life would be much simpler if it never got to that point.”

“Stop the snake demon.  Got it.”  She paused.  “Can you…my friend…I don’t suppose you can tell me if she’s all right.”

“All right is relative,” came the reply.  “She’s still around, though, if that’s what you’re worried about.  It’s the addition of her power that makes this Sandrine such a threat to the order of things.  The past belongs exactly there.”

“But can we help her?  Can we get her back?”  Buffy’s voice was rising, more insistent, but its inflection did nothing to ruffle the other woman in the room.

“Fell the tree and its roots remain.  Damaged, of course, but even life can spring from that which appears lost.”  With a small nod toward Peter, Clara gestured toward the door.  “I have prepared another gris gris for you to use,” she said.  “Go with Peter and he will get it for you.  My apologies that it is only the one.  My resources were limited.  I’m sorry it can’t be more.”

He opened the entrance, standing aside to indicate they should go out first.  For a moment, Buffy waited for the black woman to say something but when it became apparent she was done, she stepped toward the door.

Spike rose to follow, and it was then that Clara turned.  “I’d like to have a little chat with you, if you don’t mind,” she said to him.  When she witnessed the two blonds exchange a frown, she added, “This’ll only take a minute.  Then you’ll be free to go.”  She waited until they were alone to speak again.  “You’re going to have to tell her, you know.  It won’t be good if she finds out some other way.”

“Tell her what?”  His eyebrow lifted in a mocking arc.  “That you’re a daft quack with a flare for the melodramatic?”  He didn’t really believe it, but the penetrating ebony of her stare was unnerving and he willed himself not to fidget before her, lifting his chin to stare her down himself.

“I thought for a second when you showed up that you couldn’t be the one I saw,” Clara mused.  She began to circle where he stood, hands waving around him, as if they were sculpting the air that surrounded Spike.  “All those tiny blue shocks that had been there when I’d seen you all around her before were gone.  Those burning baby fish are no longer swimming, are they?  Just lying there dead, like they’d never even been.”

Panic began to wriggle in a growing frenzy within his gut, but Spike remained still as she moved, watching her out of the corners of his eyes when she disappeared behind him.  “Can’t you ever just speak plain?” he complained, but his voice was tight, his words clipped in barely controlled trepidation.  “Say what you mean, mean what you say.  It’s a good credo.  You should consider takin’ it up.”

“You’re impatient,” she scolded as if to a child.  “Rash.  That’ll be your downfall, darlin’, if you allow it to be.  You’ll hurt her when you don’t want to.”  She stopped in front of him, their eyes level.  “You could hurt her now if you chose.”

Hurt her.

It hurts.

The rush of pushing back against the man in the alley.

The silence in his head afterward.

“The chip…” Spike murmured, as the pieces fell into place.  Horrible, wonderful, hopeful, damning pieces.  “It’s not working.”

Clara shook her head.  “Can’t work if it’s not there.”

“But…how…when…?”  She said she’d seen it before, he realized.  Which meant some time since he and Buffy had arrived in the Big Easy, he had lost the chip.

“Time is not the only healer.  Sometimes, it wears the face of years gone by, even if we don’t recognize it for what it truly is.”  Her hand lifted, her fingers feathering over his brow, sliding down the worst of the burns on the left side of his face. 

“You knew…and you invited me into your home anyway?”  Through the maelstrom of his emotions, the question suggested itself in a rattled disbelief, voicing itself of its own accord, his blue eyes searching hers for some sign of fear.

There was none.  “Demons speak in satin tongues,” Clara said obliquely.  “They make promises that man knows to be false and yet there is something seductive about their voices.  Something that makes man want to answer.  To follow the path they offer.  Some do.  Some don’t.  But everyone has a choice.”  She stepped away, turning her back on him to open the door of the apartment again.  “She’s waiting for you, darlin’.  Don’t want to disappoint her, now do we?”

She was smiling as Spike brushed by her, only half-aware of the reassuring pat on his back when he passed.  Too many thoughts, and fears, and hopes, and everything, swirling around inside his skull to be aware of much more.  He was halfway down the stairs when her voice drifted down to him again.

“And I was serious about that red,” she called.  “Don’t you be forgettin’ that now.”

*************

He slumped in the back seat, feeling the sway of the car as Giles turned the corner to pull into the parking lot of the hotel, but nothing about it was relaxing.  The seat was too empty, his side bereft of companionship, and Xander’s heart ached in guilt.

It was his fault.  Though neither Tara nor Giles said anything, Xander knew that the blame for Anya’s disappearance lay entirely in his hands.  All because he hadn’t followed her.  He’d let her get away and now she really was…away.

A search of the surrounding area of Midnight had revealed nothing, and the trio had returned to the car knowing what they had suspected all along, that Sandrine and Iris had managed to snatch Anya right out from under their noses.  Giles especially was disappointed in his failure to recognize the ex-demon’s potential contribution to the voix mortelle mess, and had stewed in his own silence during the trip back to the hotel, leaving Tara curled uncomfortably against her door, eyes furtively darting from the two men every so often just to see that they were all right.

Wordlessly, they climbed out of the car, shoulders slumped.  “I-I-I’ll go see if Buffy’s back,” Tara said, but Giles voice’ stopped her before she could turn away.

“The Desoto’s not here,” he said.  The parking lot was nearly empty; it would’ve been impossible to miss the behemoth vehicle even in the dark.  “I’ll go to the front desk and leave a message for her.”

“I’ll just get the weapons upstairs,” Xander offered.  Taking the keys from Giles, he was soon left alone as Tara traipsed after the Englishman, but as he turned to go to the trunk, his eye was caught by the glint off the phone lying forgotten in the front seat. 

They hadn’t bothered to call her, he realized, stopping to stare at it.  After everything, they’d just forgotten about this potential lifeline.  She could just be hurt, or she could be trying to escape.  Maybe if he called, she could tell him where to come get her.

It was a long shot---OK, a nearly impossible shot---but desperation drove Xander to open the front door and reach for the phone.  It wouldn’t hurt to just call, he rationalized.  And it could do a world of good.

*************

He was sprawled in the chair opposite the couch, head thrown back, not even watching the girl Sandrine and Iris had ordered him to keep an eye on.  Freddie actually felt sorry for her, getting dragged into this whole mess.  Not that he really knew what was going on with her, what she had to contribute to it.  Only that she was somehow connected to Willow’s friends back in California.  She seemed familiar to him, but until Sandrine took it upon herself to fill him in on the details, he would just do what he was told and pray he didn’t piss the redhead off too badly to want him dead as well.

At least he didn’t have to put up with having them around at the moment.  He’d been called in earlier and ordered to watch the girl while they went out and had “some fun.”  He didn’t want to ask what kind of fun, and didn’t even argue about the cadre of vampire guards they already had out in the hallway.  Just sat himself in the chair and waited for them to leave.  That Iris gave him the creeps.  Always watching him like he was dinner or something.

Which he probably would be if he ever screwed up.

The muffled ring of a telephone woke him from his reverie, and Freddie frowned as he sat up.  There wasn’t a phone in this room.  Where the hell was it coming from?

Another ring, and his eyes slid to the doorway, noted the small purse on the chair near it.  The sound was coming from inside it, and he slowly rose from his seat to pick it up.  A third ring, growing louder as he undid the clasp.

“Everything all right in there?” the guard boomed from the other side of the door.

The voice startled Freddie, and his fingers fumbled to disconnect the call.  “Just fine and dandy,” he called back.  Dropping the purse back onto the chair, he held the slim phone in his hand as his eyes slid back to the unconscious girl on the couch.  Her phone.  Probably her friends calling to check up on her.

The thoughts ticked over in his brain, and slowly, Freddie slipped the phone into his pants pocket, feeling its weight settle heavily against his thigh.  “Just fine and dandy,” he murmured, and resumed his watchful place on the chair.

*************

“You did what?”

Even Giles flinched beneath the bite in Buffy’s tone, and the smirk rose to Spike’s lips as he leaned against the hotel room wall, watching as the Slayer stood in front of the trio sitting on the bed with hands on her hips.  It was kind of nice being on this side of her tongue for a change, he decided, and in spite of the chaos that was currently in his own head, there was no way he wasn’t going to take a moment to enjoy the irony of the show he was getting.  He’d spent too many days tied up at the hands of both men who now faced Buffy’s wrath, but couldn’t deny the twinge of guilt he felt at the cowed expression on Tara that was almost hidden behind her hair.

“I never---,” Giles started, but clicked his jaw shut when she started again.

“Never…what?  Listened to me when I said how dangerous Sandrine was?  Or heard how much power Iris has in town?  Do I need to tell you the whole cops in her back pocket story again?”

“Buff, it was a group decision---.”

“The group minus two, you mean,” she countered to Xander’s argument.  She gestured between herself and Spike.  “The two who’ve had, oh, I don’t know, actual contact with them?  You didn’t think that just maybe, we might know what we were talking about when we said stay away from Midnight?”

“I seem to recall you mentioning your own little Midnight adventure,” Xander said.  “Something involving some b?  Maybe a little e?”

“That was different.”

“Oh, because you went alone.  Sorry.  My mistake.  Here we thought we’d have safety in numbers.”  His voice dripped in sarcasm, and Spike watched as Buffy folded her arms across her chest in defiance.

“Obviously not if you managed to lose Anya in the process.  I forgot to ask.  Did you remember to bring the silver platter with you?  Or did we just decide to make Sandrine’s job that much easier without handing your girlfriend over on one this time?”

“Buffy, that was never our intention.”  Though he was striving to remain calm in the face of the arguing, it was a losing battle for Giles, his tone clipped and cold.

“No,” she conceded.  “I know that.  I just don’t understand why you would think you could take Sandrine and Iris on yourselves when you saw for your own eyes what she did to Spike last night.”

“There wasn’t going to be any taking,” said Xander.  “Just looking.  Trust me, taking was never on the agenda.”

“Was this the same agenda that the group decided on?  You know, the one Spike and I seem to have lost our memberships to?”

Brown eyes flicked to sweep with disdain over the lounging vampire.  “Since when is Spike part of the group?” he demanded.

“Since he’s the one who came to us in the first place about Willow getting kidnapped.  Since he’s the one who seems to be taking all the knocks trying to get her back.”

Xander’s harsh laughter rang through the small hotel room.  “Back?  Is that what’s happening here?  That must be why she’s currently being controlled by some psycho/ex-jambalaya vodou princess, right?  That’s a real bang-up job Spikey-boy’s doing there.  Remind me to add him to my Christmas card list.”

 “Enough!”  The single word cut through the air as Giles bolted to his feet, causing even Spike to stiffen at the wall.  “All this bickering is accomplishing nothing.  This isn’t about what’s been done or not done in regards to rescuing Willow, nor is it about who did it.  This is about what we’re going to do next.”

As he listened to the Watcher, Spike’s thoughts drifted, the blame that had circulated, even with Buffy’s deflection, simmering his mood into anger.  Like they bloody understand a thing about what’s goin’ on here, he thought viciously, and he stuffed his hands into his pockets as they instinctively balled into fists.  Done what I can and what thanks do I get?  The usual kick to the curb.  A boot in the face with not so much as a “by your leave” to soften the blow.  And they’re not even listening to their Slayer, when all she’s done is everything in her power to make this right.  Unforgiving gits.

His nails dug into his palms, and he felt a faint trickle of something viscous as he realized how tightly he was fighting the urge to lash out at the two men.  Sudden flashes of could test that chip theory on Harris’ face combined with recalled smells of blood and sweat and the crunch of bones shattering beneath his blows, making his nostrils flare as his jaw clenched.

Too close.  Too bloody close in here.

The door was yanked open under his grip, already half-open, when Buffy realized he’d moved and cut herself off in mid-sentence, turning to look at him in confusion.  “Where are you going?” she asked.

“Feel like a smoke,” he replied.  “I’ll just be outside.”

He didn’t even wait for a response, just strode into the stifling night air with the heavy door gliding silently shut behind him. The mechanics of the door cheated him of a satisfying slam, and Spike was tempted to turn around and kick the door for good measure, to let those inside know his frustration. He refrained, though, choosing instead to lash out at the metal rail that lined the walk along the second floor of the hotel. Wouldn’t do to get Buffy pissed off at him as well. She needed at least one ally she could count on in this debacle.

The cigarette was lit and in his mouth before he could think, and he took a long, luxurious drag of the filter, feeling the nicotine blaze into his lungs, crisping its edges even as it dulled the skittering of his nerves.  Carefully, he tuned out the words that were being exchanged on the other side of the door; they would only serve to enrage him further.

He could’ve done it, Spike realized.  A few more seconds of listening to them go at Buffy and he would’ve lost it, pouncing and pounding and glorying in hurting them just a fraction of what they were doing to his Slayer.  It wouldn’t have lasted, of course.  She would’ve pulled him off as soon as the first punch had landed, and then staked him when she realized that he’d done it without feeling the effects of the chip.

You’re going to have to tell her, the seer had said.  Won’t be good if she finds out some other way.

Because the Slayer is so good at separating her personal life from her professional, he thought derisively.  Wouldn’t make a difference to her if she thought I hung the bloody moon.  She thinks I’m a threat, she’ll stake me without blinking.  Hadn’t she done the same with Peaches?  Ran a sword through him to save the world and he was supposed to be the love of her life.  All souled up and white hat-like.  What makes you so different?

Don’t be a threat, was the obvious conclusion.  Don’t feed.  Don’t kill.  Don’t give her a reason to dust you.  Not like you haven’t been living that life for the past nine months anyway. 

But not by choice, he argued back.  Only because of this little piece of plastic inside my skull.  I’ve been denying what I am ever since they took my choice away.

Choices are made when doors are opened.  No matter what, though, the blood will flow.

Spike scowled as the seer’s words haunted his ears, sucking at the cigarette with an angry inhalation.  Can’t say what they bloody well mean, he groused, pacing along the cement, occasionally kicking at the dull gray with the toe of his boot.  Not even his years with Dru had made him like the cryptic gobbledygook that often sprouted from her mouth.  He’d often felt like taking her by the shoulders and shaking the words from her, hoping that she’d just say it straight instead of dancing around the issue.

Did the seer mean that the blood would flow because of him?  She’d known he was chipless when she let him into her flat; could that have been what she was referring to?  He wished he knew.  He wished he could just turn the decision over to someone else again because all of a sudden, not knowing which way to turn was giving him a bigger headache than those shocks ever did.

At least his thoughts from earlier made more sense now.  All that blood flowing around him, passing him on the streets, the imagery of Buffy’s blood coursing down his throat…it was his body’s way of telling him he could feed again.  Be what he truly was.  Stop toeing the leashed puppy line and return to his proper place in the demon world.

But did he have a proper place any more?  Truth be told, he liked being at the Slayer’s side.  And he’d already decided that his feelings for her were real, a tangible lock on the light that he’d heretofore not realized he yearned for.  Was he ready to throw all that away? 

Everyone has a choice.

The door opened then, and Spike took one last drag of his cigarette as he watched Buffy emerge, stopping to lean wearily against the wall of the hotel.  That lasted only a second before she grimaced, wiping at the beads of sweat that already sprung to her brow.

“Yuck,” she said, shaking out her arms as if they were stuck to her torso.  “I’m going to be so glad when we get out of this place.  Who would’ve thought that someplace called the Hellmouth wasn’t the hottest place on earth?”

The grin tugged at his lips, and he ducked his head so that she wouldn’t misconstrue his mirth, using the action to exhale the smoke from his lungs.  “Get everything all sorted?” he asked.  “Or do you need me to go in there and knock a few heads together?  Betcha didn’t know the boy’s head makes this frankly satisfying hollow sound when it hits the floor.”

He played it as a joke, but warily watched for her response.  Test one for the waters, Spike thought.  How’re you goin’ to take it if I actually can follow through on that promise, luv?

Either she didn’t hear it or she was choosing to ignore his comment, because Buffy only sighed, stepping to his side to lean against the railing and look out over the mostly empty parking lot.  “We’re going to go out in the morning and look around in daylight.  See if we can scrounge up any clues as to what happened with Anya.”  At his frown, she shook her head.  “Don’t worry.  No more breaking and entering for this girl.  I’m not really up to having to deal with police again.  Although if Iris shows her fangs around there, I might rethink the breaking part of that.  For some reason, I’ve got a serious jones for hurting her in severe ways.  I’m thinking dismemberment might be kind of fun.”

“What about me?  There a spot for me in that plan of yours that doesn’t involve fiery death?”

Her gaze softened and she glanced up at the remaining burns on his face.  “You should be resting anyway,” she said.  “Finish healing and I promise to take you out tomorrow night and kill some kind of nasty.”

“Crumbs.  Thanks.”  It came out more bitterly than he intended, but the reminder that he was only of use to her during the night, or that she thought that anyway, stung.

He saw the flicker of irritation in her face, but when she spoke, her words reflected none of that.  “Actually, I was kind of hoping you could help Tara with some magic stuff.  She’s staying behind to try and figure out what exactly happened with Willow and Sandrine.  And how the staff thingy actually works.  If they do happen to get both pieces, we need to know what they plan on doing with it before we can stop them.”

“Oh.”  All he could say, really.  One more conclusion he’d incorrectly jumped to.  How in hell was he supposed to know what to decide on telling her about the chip if he couldn’t even read something as simple as her plans for him?

“What did that Clara tell you after I left?” Buffy asked.  She’d been dying to ask him ever since leaving the shop, but his aloofness and then the discovery of Anya’s disappearance had prevented her from finding out before now.

Spike shrugged.  “Just a bit of warning,” he said.  “Told me not to be rash or someone would end up gettin’ hurt.”  It wasn’t really lying if he just didn’t tell her the whole story.  Clara had called him rash, and though she’d specified Buffy would be the one to get hurt, there was no reason for the Slayer to know that.  Not yet.

Her laugh surprised him.  “I could’ve told you that,” she said lightly.  “Thinking things through isn’t exactly your strong suit.”

If only she knew, Spike thought.  If only she could see just how much bloody thinking he was doin’ right then, Buffy might begin to realize that she wasn’t as knowledgeable about him as she thought.

“Did you fill Rupert in on the other that she had to say?” he asked instead, deflecting the topic of conversation from himself.

“I told him you and I were going to sit down tonight and write out what she said so that he could look at it in the morning.”  She stepped in front of him, letting her hand play with the hem of his t-shirt.  “You know, back in our room.”

“You told him that?”  His eyebrow shot up, incredulous.  “And he doesn’t have a problem with…you and me?”

She couldn’t quite meet his eyes, focusing instead on the line of skin playing with his shirt was affording her.  “OK, so maybe I didn’t phrase it exactly like that,” she confessed.  “When the issue of sleeping arrangements came up, it became painfully obvious they meant for me and Tara to share now that Anya’s not around because Xander and Giles were arguing about which one had to bunk with you.  So, I used Clara as an excuse and said it wasn’t a problem making sure you stayed out of trouble since I’d been doing it since we left Sunnydale anyway.”

“Gee, thanks, Slayer.”

She misinterpreted his tone and stepped back.  “I’m going to tell them about us,” she said.  “Just not when things are so…stressy.”  Though she was smiling, Buffy couldn’t help the feeling of unease creeping over her skin, and looked up at him quizzically.  “What’s with being so bad moody?” she asked.  “I mean, I know things aren’t great with this new development about Anya, but I thought, you know…things were better between us.”

If he kept this up, it wouldn’t make a difference if he told her or not; she’d suss it out on her own.  Enjoy what you got, mate, he thought.  Don’t try fixin’ what’s not broke.

One hand snaked forward and curled around Buffy’s waist, tugging her against him.  “Like that word,” he murmured, and slid his grip around to settle in the small of her back, gently pressing her hips against him so that she could feel his rising arousal.

“And what word’s that?”

“Us.”  He saw her eyes flicker over his shoulder at the window and jerked his head toward their own room in response to her trepidation at a public display.  “Why don’t we continue this conversation in private?” Spike said.

“Can we make a detour first?”

“For what?”

“You’ll see.”

*************

He was in the bathroom, ostensibly to take a look at his wounds and clean them up if necessary, leaving her to pull their things from the various bags.  The fact that the one that had held the evening gowns Spike had bought for her had already been rummaged through did not escape Buffy’s attention, and she silently thanked the fashion gods that Anya had picked the black one to wear and not the green.  Kind of a superficial thought, she knew, considering Anya was now most likely being held hostage, but at least she was going to be a well-dressed hostage. 

Her fingers fell to the ice bucket, sifting through the already-melting cubes, watching the tiny refractions trapped within their glacial walls scatter against the white plastic of the container.  At some point, they were actually going to have to do what she told Giles they were going to, but for now, Buffy just wanted to spend some time following through on the promises Spike had made during their search.  In spite of the shift in his mood after leaving Clara’s, the touch of his hand in hers as they’d walked from Giles’ room to theirs had dispelled any doubts she might’ve had, returning her to the fantasy land of just what else the vampire could do with those ice cubes.  Just the thought of his---.

“Buffy!”

Spike’s voice cut through her reverie, and she automatically turned toward the bathroom, crossing the room in three steps only to pause as her hand hovered over the doorknob.  Silly, she scolded herself.  He wouldn’t have called you if he didn’t want you to come in.  Funny how nervous she felt about offending him all of a sudden.

She opened the door to see him standing at the sink, bare to the waist, hands braced on either side of the porcelain.  His head didn’t even turn to see her enter; his gaze remained fixed on the drain below him.

“Do me a favor and tell me what my back looks like?” he said.  His voice was tight, and she noticed then how tautly the skin was pulled over his knuckles, whiter there than anywhere else she could see.  “I’d check it out myself, but seein’ as I’m reflection-deficient…”

Buffy rushed forward.  “Why didn’t you tell me it was hurting?” she demanded.  “If you’ve opened something up, I should get…”  Her words fell away as her eyes settled on the expanse of his back.

All the burns were gone.

Tentatively, she brushed a finger over the contour of his shoulder blades, marveling at the resilience of the skin stretched over the muscles.  Not a single mark.  Like his encounter with Sandrine had never even happened.  A slide around to the front of his body showed the same unblemished marble.  The only burns---if they could even really be called that any more---were on his face, scattered across his temple and cheekbone. 

Well, at least one thing is working for me, Buffy thought with more than a sense of awe.  Spike’ll be back in the game tomorrow for sure, stronger and better than ever at this rate.

When her silence stretched into a minute, Spike let out a long sigh and loosened his hold, his shoulders falling to match the incline of his head.  “Guess that means it’s all free and clear back there,” he said.

“Gotta love that healing juice,” Buffy replied.  “Remind me in the morning to promise Tara my firstborn child for doing this.”  She took a step, expecting him to straighten, but frowned when he remained in his position.  “How do you feel?” she asked.  This should be good news.  She didn’t understand why he wasn’t happier about it.

His response was a long time coming.  “Hungry,” he finally said, though his voice was so low that the lone word was almost imperceptible.

“Oh.”  It wasn’t what she was expecting.  “You want me to heat you something up?  I think there’s a microwave---.”

“Don’t.  I’ll be…fine.”

He didn’t sound fine.  He sounded upset.

No longer worried about hurting him, her hand wrapped around his bicep, forcing him to straighten and look at her.  “Enough with the avoiding,” she said.  “Something bugged you at Clara’s and I want to know what it is.”

The gold glinting in the blue depths of his eyes took her by surprise, and she instinctively stiffened, relaxing her grip as she stepped back.  It didn’t go unnoticed, and Spike’s lip curled into a smirk.  “What’s the matter, Slayer?” he taunted, and as she watched, switched into his game face.  “Don’t tell me you forgot what I was there for a minute.”

“No, it’s just…”  She lifted her chin, refusing to bow beneath whatever had sparked this change in him.  “What’s wrong?” she demanded.  “You only go ridge-y when you’re angry.”

“Wrong.”

“What, you’re not angry?”

“It’s not the only time.”  With a sharp shake of his head, Spike’s human features returned, but the tension in his jaw lingered.  No reason to tell her it happened when he felt like he was losing control as well.  Like now.  The damn hunger.  And her blood, pumping and rich and too damn close.

Brushing past her, he went out into the main room, ignoring her step right behind him, and stalked to where the cooler sat on the dresser, yanking it open and extracting a single blood bag.  A sharp bite at the plastic cut a hole in the top and Spike poured the liquid into one of the mugs they’d taken from the house.  He had it halfway to his lips when Buffy snatched it away from him, turning toward the microwave.

“At least let me heat it,” she said.  “Why didn’t you say something?  It’s not like I’m expecting you not to eat in front of me.  I’ve seen it a million times.”

He stood behind her, the pair of them watching the mug circle in endless revolutions inside the appliance, until the bell dinged and she pulled it out to hand to him.  “Thanks,” he muttered, but was unable to meet her eyes as he gulped it down, feeling it course over his tongue, staving away the worst of the pangs even as it reminded him of what exactly he was missing.

It wasn’t usually this bad.  It had to be because of knowing he actually could, that the absence of the chip made all those dreams and fantasies now possible.  Not that he wanted to, not in the truest sense of the word.  Putting his welfare ahead of Buffy’s made him no better than those so-called friends of hers.  Ignoring what her contributions were, how hard she was trying. 

And she was.  Trying.  So hard.  Even now as she took the empty mug from his hands, disappearing into the bathroom to rinse it out like it was the most natural thing in the world.

How could he even consider doing anything that would spoil that?

He was stretched out on the bed when she came back into the room, staring up at the ceiling.  “We should probably talk,” he said.

Fuck.  Why couldn’t he just leave well enough alone?  The seer hadn’t said when he should tell her, just that he should.  Bringing it up now was like ripping off the scab of a barely healed wound.

She sat on the edge of the mattress, bare legs only inches from his side, and dropped a hand to rest gently on his shoulder.  “So talk.”

He’d asked for it.  Now what in hell was he going to say?

“Something’s tellin’ me that my hasty return to my normally good-looking self isn’t completely because of the mojo.”  He fought to return to some semblance of snarky, lightening his tone and stabilizing his nerves.  The blood had helped, fending off his hunger so that he could focus on other things.  And the change in subject would work.  It was a genuine concern and didn’t deal specifically with the issue of the chip.  Rolling onto his side, he propped his head up on his hand to look at her.  “Well, not our mojo, anyway.”

His move broke their contact.  “What’re you saying?  You think someone else is waving their magic wand around here?”

Spike shrugged.  “You got a better explanation for it?  We both know I was pretty bad off there.  And as chuffed as I get about my own prowess, even I know I can’t heal that fast.”

“But the healing spell---.”

“---helped, I’m sure, but when have you ever seen one of the witch’s spells work so well?”  When she didn’t respond right away, he went on.  “Only thing I can think of is that it has something to do with my little visitor when you were out hotcaking.”

“That Cecily?  You think she’s a witch of some sort?”

He snorted.  “Bitch is more like it,” he muttered.

“You said it wasn’t possible it was her.”

“It’s not.  She’s long dead by now.  Whoever came a-knockin’ just decided to look like her.  That seer…she said something else when I was up there.  Something about healers wearing faces of years gone by.  I think she was talkin’ about Cecily.”

Buffy’s eyes dropped then, and she began tracing the floral pattern in the bedspread, lost in thought.  “Who was this Cecily?” she finally asked, her voice low.

He didn’t want to answer but something in the pit of his stomach pulled the words from his throat.  “Someone I used to know.”

“Did you kill her?”

“No.  I…she was…”  What?  It had been so long since he’d actively thought of her.  How could he characterize her for Buffy without giving too much of himself away?  Because wouldn’t that just be too embarrassing.  The Slayer getting involved with the ex-poet?  Not bloody likely.  “…someone I knew before I was turned.  Just a girl.  No one special.”

“Special enough for you to remember her after a hundred and twenty years.”

Damn.  She had a point.  “I thought…was a little hung up on her, I guess,” he finally managed.  “But she wouldn’t…she didn’t…”

Buffy’s gaze lifted then, green gleaming as she eased herself to lie down next to him.  “She was stupid, then, is what you’re telling me,” she said softly.  Her hand came up to touch his bare chest, a feather of air tickling his skin.  “So…whoever came knew they could get to you by posing as her,” she mused.

“Yeah.”  It didn’t seem so important any more that they talk about his healing, or the chip, or its absence, or any of the other.  Not with her so near.  Not with every inch of him screaming in resonance with her heartbeat.  All he wanted was to hold her, and kiss her, and love her, until she was screaming in kind.  Fuck talking.

“And I think we can rule out Sandrine or Iris having anything to do with making you better,” Buffy continued.  Her palm was creating whorls of sensation along his chest where it skipped and fluttered, seemingly oblivious to the effect it was having on him.  “They wanted you dead last night.  Well, they wanted both of us dead.  Something tells me they’re not interested in helping you in any way.”

“Yeah.”  Rational thought was impossible, his fingers itching to curl into her flesh, to tug her on top of him, to rake along her skin until she burned as badly as he did.

“Which means we’ve got a third party involved,” she concluded.  Her breathing was starting to go ragged, hitching just ever so slightly, and he watched her golden head duck, felt her tongue flick over his hardened nipple.  “Someone we don’t know about.”

“Seems that way.”  His right hand clawed into his hair, rooting itself to his scalp, as he fought the instinct to grab her.  Only the agony of the anticipation of more stayed his touch.  “Can’t imagine…who…”

Buffy lifted her head, and he saw the ebony of her pupils swallowing the iris, a flush of desire creeping high into her cheeks.  “Did you love her?” she asked.

It took him a moment to understand who she was talking about, and then another to realize she was holding her breath while he waited for him to answer.  “Didn’t know what love was then,” he replied.  “Not really.”

“And now you do.”

“A bloke learns a lot when he hangs around for a century.”  He had to touch her then, couldn’t resist the silk of her hair as he pushed it away from her face, exposing the arch of her cheek to his fingertips.  “And then sometimes, it just takes a second.”

She was leaning forward then, and there was no way he was going to refuse the pout of her lips, capturing it between his teeth as his hand slid around the back of her neck.  Hot, and needing, and pulsing against his mouth, the intoxication of her taste eclipsed all other thoughts in his mind; only the craving of her, the necessity of having her, seemed to matter.

“Spike…” she breathed.

“What?” 

“The ice…”

“Sod the ice.”  His lips pressed harder against hers, coaxing them to part so that he could fully savor her mouth, sucking and devouring until her fingers clawed at the healed skin of his back, urging him closer. 

“Just want this to be about us,” he added when she finally broke away for air.  His arm curled around her waist, tugging her closer.  Never could be close enough, he realized, even as her pelvis found his, the outline of his erection molding to the cleft between her thighs.

His mouth nuzzled at her throat, every beat of her pulse maddening him further, sending the same tempo along the length of his cock as it ached to be released from the confines of his jeans.  All the doubts, all the questions, all the confusion, fled in the face of her embrace, and though the scent of her blood permeated the membranes of her skin, it was only a fraction of the essence that was Buffy, a swirl of copper, sweat, and a unique musk eddying to drive him mad while at the same time simplifying what had seemed so difficult.

Chip.  No chip.  Didn’t make a difference.

This was where he belonged.

He’d do whatever it took to keep it that way.

Her hands were tugging at his jeans, strong and nimble, and Spike growled as he pressed her back into the bed, catching her wrists and pinning them over her head.   Their eyes locked, and he hesitated as he searched the green depths.

“What?” Buffy asked.  “You’re stopping.  Don’t stop.”  She wriggled beneath him, but didn’t break his grip, not exerting even a fraction of the strength necessary to do so, he realized.

Letting his free hand slide between them, he deftly undid her shorts, slid his fingers inside her heat, smiling in satisfaction when she moaned at his touch.  “Say the words again, luv,” he whispered.

She squirmed, the quivering in her thighs overwhelming.  The chill of his fingers glided along her inner lips, consciously skirting any contact with her clit, but it was the pressure of his body against hers, weighing her down into the mattress that prompted her to drive his hand back.  Without breaking his hold on her, she circled him in her arms in an action that stilled his strokes.

“I’ve never known anyone like you before,” she said and saw the wonder creep into his eyes.  “I’ve never…” And she paused, the daring she’d just felt slipping from her grasp like liquid through her fingers.  Desperately, she swallowed, and braved it anyway.  “…never…loved anyone like you before,” Buffy finished.

The light that flared in his gaze disappeared from her view when his head came down, his mouth returning to hers to claim back the kisses she’d stolen previously.  Their hands fell away, pulling and tugging at their clothing as they rushed to bare themselves, never breaking away from the succor of their kissing, even when they lay naked on the bedspread, her legs lifting to wrap around his lean hips.

Spike’s hands settled on her waist as the tip of his cock brushed along the length of her slit, teasing her with the promise even as it tortured him with the wait.  So much more than he’d expected.  He’d only wanted her to admit to needing him again.  To say the other…he knew she could’ve meant it in a sexual way, but for now, he was going to believe in the literal translation of her words.  That she loved him. 

The wait became interminable for both of them, and almost by mutual consent, Spike pressed upward, guiding the length of his arousal into her wet depths, feeling her inner walls first expand and then constrict around him, sucking him in deeper and deeper until the weight of his balls rested against her.  Buffy’s fingers ran down the curve of his spine as he held himself there, and when he began the slow action of pumping in and out of her, never taking his eyes from her face, she moved her hands to his ass, guiding and holding him as it moved above her.

Each stroke carried with it its own rhythm, a unique tenor that sang through both of their bodies.  Breath after breath, beat after beat, his tempo gradually increased, his hands dancing over her curves, sliding between them to tease and taunt her nipples before joining his cock at her pussy.

When she felt his touch on her clit, Buffy bucked, forcing Spike to fight against her strength to keep her on the bed, driving himself harder and faster inside her as he increased the pressure.  Her head arched back, and just as he’d been fantasizing about it earlier, the curve of her neck bared to him in luscious glory, inviting him to taste even as he pushed both of them to their climaxes. 

Spike’s eyes fixated on the pulse point at the hollow of her throat, felt the demon inside begin to fight against his control.  It would be so easy, he thought.  He could do it and in her current state of arousal, she wouldn’t have the power to stop him.  And it would be good, he knew.

But not as good as this, whispered Reason.  And not as good as before, and hearing her voice say those surprising things to him when he least expected it, and seeing her roll her eyes when he said something that particularly annoyed her, and tasting the sweet nectar of her kisses.  That couldn’t even begin to compare.

So instead he rested his forehead to hers, feeling her sweat slick the path, and pushed her harder, their bodies aching for release even as she fought to breathe.

When she came, she screamed, clinging to his back with a fervor that ceased his strokes, locking him in place while her muscles clenched around him, driving him closer and closer to his own release than if she’d allowed him to continue.  The instant her hold eased, however, Spike resumed his thrusts, burying himself with each upward movement, pushing himself to his own orgasm with a shuddering cry that was muffled when he closed his mouth over hers.

Buffy’s hands came up to the back of his head, combing through his now-mussed curls as she kissed him back, unexpected relief that he hadn’t laughed in her face at her confession superceding the warmth of her orgasm.  “Love you,” she whispered again when he finally broke free, and was rewarded with a surprisingly shy upturn of his lips, the most gentle of nips along her jaw before his mouth settled just below her ear.

“Like those words, too,” Spike murmured.

As he slid to her side, the fluids of their bodies already beginning to dry in the chilled air of the hotel room, he felt her sigh of contentment relax her muscles as she nestled back against him, joining it with his own satisfied groan.  His nose nuzzled the loose strands of her hair, and carefully, Spike tightened his grip around her waist.

He knew he’d have to tell her about the chip one of these days.  Clara was right about that.

Just didn’t have to be right now.

*************

Her head was killing her.  Carefully, as if moving would mean even more pain, Anya lifted her hand to the side of her skull and felt the knot that had formed there after that stupid vampire Tom had hit her over the head.  Way to go for making Xander jealous, she thought irritably.  You win first prize in the stupid stunts of the century contest.

She knew without opening her eyes where she would be.  Well, maybe not the specifics, but she knew who was responsible for giving her the killer headache and dumping her on one horrifically uncomfortable couch.  It could only be Sandrine and Iris, and she was still somewhere in whatever they were dubbing their lair these days.  Anywhere else, and surely someone would’ve been instantly at her side as soon as she had moved, offering her a cold beverage or maybe some gratifying sex to make up for having gotten her kidnapped in the first place.

As if in direct response to her thoughts, Anya heard a faint creak off to her left and realized she wasn’t as alone as she thought.  One eye cracked open, and she squinted into the blinding light of the room.  “Xander?” she asked faintly.

“Freddie,” came back the reply, and her lids fluttered shut again.

Crap.  Freddie was the one who snatched Willow.  Suspicions confirmed.

“Are you thirsty?” Freddie asked.  “I don’t have keys to the liquor cabinet but there’s some water.  It might just take the edge off until somebody around this place decides to wake up and let us get some kind of proper breakfast.”

He sounded annoyed, and Anya frowned as she opened her eyes again.  A couple firm blinks made the light inside the room more palatable and she saw the young man sprawled on a chair nearby.  Not bad-looking was her first thought, followed almost immediately by, but not as good-looking as Xander.  There was something about him, though, something familiar, and she couldn’t stop the query from popping out of her mouth.

“Have we met?” she asked.

Freddie grinned.  “Officially, the answer would be no.  Unofficially, the answer is kind of no, kind of yes.  I’m Freddie.”

“You said that already.”

“And you’re Anyanka.”

“Anya,” she automatically corrected.  “Wait.  Did I wreak vengeance on you or something?  Is that how I know you?”

His grin grew wider, like the Cheshire Cat’s, and she had the instinctive reaction to slap it from his face.  “Kind of yes, kind of no,” he said obliquely.

In spite of her headache, Anya pulled herself up into a sitting position, noting for the first time the plush interior of the room.  She hadn’t been bound, and as far as she could see, this Freddie wasn’t armed.  Was it possible she wasn’t being held captive after all?  A quick assessment of the interior again, though, negated that question.  It reeked of the same Arabian night/post-modern opulence that the club did.  It had to belong to the vampire Buffy had told them about.

“Look, I’m not one who’s really very big on skirting around the issue,” she said, smoothing out the wrinkles in her dress.  “So, why don’t you just get over this need of yours to play Mr. Mystery and tell me what the hell is going on here because I have a monster headache and I’m really not in the mood to pussyfoot around.  So.  Let’s start with an easy one, OK?  Like, where am I?  Am I still at Midnight?”

He nodded.  “These are Iris’ private quarters.”

“And you’re the guy who kidnapped Willow.”  When he seemed reluctant to confirm, she sighed in annoyance.  “OK, see, now that wasn’t actually a question, so you don’t have to worry about giving too much of your…”  She used air quotes to say the next.  “…’evil plot’ away.  I know this is about the voix mortelle, and I know that somehow, Sandrine has decided to come back from the dead and take over Willow’s body.  Whatever.  What I don’t know is why, or what taking me hostage has to do with anything.”

“But…Willow is Sandrine.”

That made her pause, and Anya’s eyes narrowed as she studied him.  The events of the attack on Spike, and the words of Halfrek, and her own recollections of the last time she’d been in New Orleans, combined to settle into a pattern, albeit an unbelievable one, inside her brain.  “And you’re Percy,” she said slowly.  “That’s why you look so familiar.  You have his eyes.”

“Well, technically, I have his soul.  That’s the way the whole reincarnation gig works, you know.  But give the girl a prize anyway.”  He stopped, looking at her quizzically.  “It is girl now, right?  You’re not a demon anymore?”

His casual dismissal of her status pissed her off, and Anya bridled under his gaze.  “Only in the technical definition of the term,” she said.  “So you don’t want to mess with me.  Just because I can’t actually do most of the things I learned as a vengeance demon, doesn’t mean I haven’t still held on to a few of the tricks.  And it’s done wonders for my imagination.”

“You’re not moving, though.”

“Did I not mention the headache I have?  I’m…regrouping.”  She rolled her eyes at his smug attitude, and collapsed back into the couch.  “So there used to be three of you,” she commented.  “Where’s Bettina?  Who gets to be her?”

His smile disappeared, a cloud shading his gaze in pain.  “That was Stella,” he replied.

His use of the past tense didn’t go unnoticed.  “Great,” she muttered.  “So Sandrine really is back on her homicidal ego trip.  I was kind of hoping she was just saving the nasty stuff for demons and Slayers.”

“Nope.  She’s pretty much nasty to everyone.  Except for Iris, for some reason.  The two of them are gettin’ on thick as thieves.”

“That won’t last.  Sandrine hates sharing.”

“Tell me about it.”

The moment of commiseration wrapped around them like a warm blanket.  “You know,” Anya finally said, “Buffy’s going to do everything she can to stop whatever Sandrine has planned.  It’s very likely you could get caught in the crossfire.  Not that she’ll kill you, of course.  She has this whole honor thing when it comes to humans.  But it doesn’t mean she won’t find a way to make your life completely miserable.  Like making sure you go to jail.  Or letting Iris make you her lunch.”  OK, so that last wasn’t true, but Freddie didn’t know that and she watched in satisfaction as he visibly paled.

“Sandrine’s very powerful,” he said, but it lacked his normal conviction.

“And do you have any idea how many apocalypses Buffy has stopped?” Anya countered.  “She will win.  That’s just what she does.  But…”  She leaned forward conspiratorially, a sly gleam in her eye.  “…I’ll bet if you were to let me go, maybe even come with me and tell everyone what exactly is going on, she’d give you a break.  And not one of the bone-crunching kind, if you know what I mean.”

A long silence followed.  “I let you go, and Sandrine’ll have my head for sure,” Freddie finally said.  “Do you really think the woman who made me kill my best friend in front of her will think twice about serving me up for Iris’ breakfast if you get away?”  He shook his head sadly.  “I don’t think so.  As much as I’m beginning to regret getting into this little mess, I’ve got my own skin to be thinking about here.  And I like it wrapped around my body, thank you very much.  Not hanging in strips like some sort of sick mobile.  My advice to you is just do what she says and hope she’s in a good mood when she decides to kill you so that she makes it quick.  ‘Cause if you piss her off?  She will make your life hell.  You can take my word on that.”

It was the defeat in his voice that made her skin itch.  As she hugged her arms close around her body, burrowing deeper into the cushions of the couch, Anya rolled his words over and over in her head, the memories of how psychotic Sandrine had been the first time around chilling her veins in fear.  Great, she thought.  And Willow is not exactly bursting with the Anya love either.   Add them together, toss in a side of good old-fashioned revenge, and what did she get?

Screwed to the wall.  And very much not in an orgasmic way.

*************

As terrified as the realization made her, Willow was getting used to her disembodiment, manipulating her awareness of Sandrine’s activities enough to keep some semblance of sanity at the same time.  More than a few of the images that filtered through the other presence’s consciousness made Willow begin to think that tackling demons on the Hellmouth wasn’t such a bad recreational activity after all.  Anything had to be better than having front row tickets to the Psycho Horror Picture Show.   Even spending an afternoon listening to Anya discuss the virtue of ben-wa balls was preferable to what she was currently going through.

Anya.  Remembering the events of the previous night burned Willow in guilt.   Sandrine had plans for the ex-demon; she’d had them ever since going through the redhead’s memories and realizing she was friends with the same person who had destroyed the voix mortelle the first time around.  Why weren’t you with Xander?  Why the Miss Flirty routine with Tom?  And why were you even here? Didn’t Buffy tell you what happened to Spike? 

Not that there was anything she could’ve done to stop Sandrine.  Not in putting the order out to snatch Anya, and not in distracting her best friend for the few minutes it would take to do so. 

But it was done now, and knowing what was planned only made Willow more determined to do something about stopping it, in whatever way she could.  She’d spent the entire previous day planning on what she would do in her small window of opportunity come sunrise, and now, she was waiting on pins and needles for Sandrine to wake up just enough so that she could implement her plan.

It came slowly this time. 

Physical sensation was the first to arrive, the heat from the bare body draped over hers making her sticky in spite of the air conditioning in the apartment.  Sandrine hadn’t even known the guy’s name when she’d picked him out from the crowd at the bar she’d dragged Iris to, but it didn’t prevent her from taking him back to ravish until the poor guy passed out.  You’d think she hadn’t had sex in years, Willow thought.  Oh.  Except… maybe she hasn’t.

She could smell him then.  Sweat.  Cheap cologne.  Stale beer.  Yuck. 

So glad I’m gay now.

Though her eyes weren’t open, Willow could feel the beginnings of Sandrine’s mind waking, slimy fingers slithering to pollute her mind.  This is it.  The window’s only cracked, but I can’t waste it.

She focused her attention on rising from the bed and walking over to the desk in the room, picturing it like a silent movie.  I really need a soundtrack.  Maybe Flight of the Bumblebee.  Except that made her dizzy, considering, even though Sandrine followed her example by doing exactly as she acted it out in her head, stumbling slightly as her drowsy lids refused to open completely.

She didn’t know yet just how much control she could exert, whether directing her body’s actions was all or if she could command her voice, too.  Now wasn’t the time for experimentation, though.  Now, she had a plan to execute, and she couldn’t afford to be playing footloose and fancy-free trying to see what kind of a puppetmaster she really was.

Paper.

Pen.

Where’s the pen?

Willow felt the frown furrow her brow as Sandrine pulled open the drawer to look for the writing implement, rooting in the mussed interior only to come up empty.  She could’ve sworn she’d seen it out of the corner of her eye before falling into bed with whats-his-name; it had to be here somewhere.  Each pass of her gaze over the top only woke the other presence up more, though, and she felt the panic begin to rise in her throat until her eyes caught the tip of what she was seeking poking out from underneath a ledger in the corner.

Bingo.

The words she’d chosen were scribbled hastily across the page of the notepad, pointed and concise to save on time, and she ripped it out, folding it in half and writing the name on the outer edge.  The grasp that had been a slither in her awareness began to be claws, and Willow fought to maintain control long enough to see her plan through.

She can’t catch me now.  She’ll know I’m here.

Door.  Get to the door.

Oops.  Still naked.  Grab the robe.

Crap.  Where’d that guard go?

The hall was empty as she pulled the edges of the robe together, and Willow’s gaze swept up and down it as she mentally bemoaned lazy vampires who left their posts when Iris specifically said to keep an eye on her.  Like I’m going to try and escape.  Well, Sandrine would, but she needs to stick around if she wants her whole let’s be evil and take over the world scheme to work.

Her panic was escalating into a full-blown anxiety attack as her tenuous manipulation began to fray, but when the vampire appeared around the corner, the sound of the opening door alerting him to her presence, she mentally exhaled.  OK, look evil so that he won’t make you talk.  How do you look evil?  Think leather.  Think Spike.  Think attitude. 

Oh, holy mother earth, just think of something and do it.

As she pressed the paper into his hand, the words tumbled from her mouth.  “He doesn’t get this in half an hour and you’ll be burning brighter than a Chinese firecracker, got it?”

The vampire visibly blanched and a startled Willow watched him rush away before slipping back inside the room.  She leaned heavily against the door.  Wow.  Boy, do I love the sound of my voice.  My words.  And who knew vamps could actually get paler?

Her glee in the success of her plan was quickly shuttled to non-existence as Sandrine finished waking, snapping to attention with a crisp slap, and Willow was once again relegated to the sidelines, watching as the other surveyed the room in curiosity, her confusion about why exactly she was up and out of bed darkening her thoughts.  There was no evidence that she suspected anything was wrong though, and as she dropped the robe back to a silken heap on the floor, Willow allowed herself to relax just ever so slightly.

It could still work.  She’d chosen the only other person who seemed to be trapped in Sandrine’s spell who might be willing to do something about it, and though she wasn’t convinced he would actually do anything, it was at least worth a shot in trying.  And if that didn’t work, she’d just try something else.  She had her voice.  There were other options she could always try.

It wasn’t like she didn’t have all day to come up with something.

*************

“We don’t have all day,” Spike growled as he eased the Desoto to the curb.  “Buffy said they’d be back at the hotel by noon to play show and tell on what everyone’s sussed out today.”

“I know,” Tara replied.  She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye.  The irritation was very much a façade.  The vampire had been humming under his breath ever since she’d come to his room to request his help in getting some more supplies for the spells she had in mind, even casually switching to an easy listening station on the radio in the car when she’d grimaced at the blaring of the punk in the speakers.  More than once, she had caught him with a wistful smile on his face, but every time he saw her noticing him, Spike would affect an air of studied nonchalance. 

In a way, it was almost funny.  Where last night, he had been obviously angry at the whole mess with Anya, barely containing his rage as Xander and Buffy had argued, today he sat as if all was right with the world, as if nothing anybody said or did could make a dent in his good mood.  Yet, he was embarrassed when Tara noticed, shifting to indifference when he thought she was paying attention, only to slide back into whatever private paradise he was imagining that was making him so happy when she looked away.

“You want to come in?” she offered, pointing to the magic shop that was only just opening.  “Didn’t you say something about wanting some burba weed?”  She already knew he had.  Knowing Buffy wanted him to spend the morning finishing up healing and faced with a young witch who said she’d just go get the supplies without him, it had been his way of justifying sneaking out into daylight to drive her himself.  Big Bad Big Brother, that’s what he is, she thought.  Except I better not say that out loud or he’ll get pissy for sure.  “They probably have it here.”

She saw his eyes flicker through the cracks in the blacked out windows, assessing the people walking by on the street, before shrugging as if he didn’t really have an opinion.  “S’long as you don’t expect me to be paying for any of your fixings,” Spike said as he reached into the seat behind him for his blanket.  His eyes glinted in amusement.  “I saw how much dosh you had in your purse when you made me stop for that coffee.”

She couldn’t help her small smile as she realized he was playing with her.  “I think someone’s just cranky,” Tara teased.  “It’s not my fault Starbucks doesn’t sell blood frappuccinos.”

“And I’m tellin’ you, they’d make a soddin’ fortune,” he countered as he slipped the blanket over his head.

There must be some kind of generic blueprint for magic shops that you can buy when you open one, Tara thought as she followed a smoking Spike through the door.  Dimly lit, with shelves carrying a cornucopia of magical minutiae, it looked very much like the store back in Sunnydale.  It was just missing Mr. Bogarty behind the counter.  In his place was a girl who looked to be her age, absorbed in flipping through a Cosmo laid out on the counter, bubble gum cracking as she chewed casually away.  She didn’t even look up when her first customers of the day walked in.

“I shouldn’t be very long,” Tara said to Spike.  “I have a list.”

He nodded and sauntered off, leaving her to stand and stare around her as she tried to determine where to start.  Most of what she needed was run-of-the-mill, so replacing what they’d used would be simple.  Plus, she hadn’t anticipated the healing spell they’d done on Spike to work so effectively, so those were ingredients that would definitely be good to have on hand, should the need to cast it arise again.

She’d been surprised to see his face bereft of any of the burns when she’d first walked in on him that morning.  He’d even moved with his usual feral grace, devoid of any visible pain.  When she’d asked how he was feeling, though, she hadn’t been prepared for the smile that curved his lips, his head ducking shyly as he’d headed for the bathroom.

“Right as rain,” he’d said quietly.

Whatever had happened between him and Buffy after leaving for their room the previous night had obviously settled the fears that she’d sensed when she’d redressed his wounds.  She only hoped that they would find Willow soon enough so that hers could get settled as well.

She was lost in her thoughts, her arms laden with items, when the door swished open and closed again.  It wasn’t until she felt the soft brush of someone’s sleeve against her bare skin of her elbow that she realized she and Spike were no longer alone in the shop.

“Sorry about that,” the young man who’d bumped her said.

Tara looked up to see a youthful face, marred with a series of scars around his left eye, the smell of motor oil clinging to his skin though it appeared to be clean, and just nodded in mute acceptance of his apology.  When she turned to head for the shelf of talismans where she could get the last of her items, she immediately bumped into another man, older but almost identically scarred.  The smile he cast down to her raised goosebumps along her arms, especially when he stepped forward to press her into the shelves behind her back. 

“Interestin’ place, ain’t it, sugar?” the second man drawled.  His voice was low enough so that only she and his companion could hear him, the heat from his body causing rivulets of sweat to begin dripping down her back in spite of the air conditioning within the shop.  “’Course, I’m goin’ to bet it’s not nearly as interestin’ as you.”  Thick fingers came up to flick the ends of her hair over her shoulder, and too close, Tara saw the calluses roughening the pads, his nails that had been chewed down to the quick.

Speech was impossible.  Instinctively, her body curled into itself, her head lowering as she felt the fear begin to boil in her stomach.  Go away, she chanted silently.  Please.  Just leave me alone.

He was heedless of her reaction.  Taking the topmost jar from Tara’s grasp, the man gave it a rough shake.  “’Course, only those who lay down with the devil deal in witchcraft.  You a witch?  Or just lookin’ for some Halloween trinkets?”  He didn’t wait for an answer, and Tara felt his friend step closer to her side, her heart starting to pound inside her chest.  “I’m thinking…witch.  You got the look about you.  Don’t she got the look, Daryl?”

Daryl nodded.  “Yep, she got the look.”

She couldn’t move.  Each word, each twang, even the acrid scent of their skin, sent Tara back to the small community in which she’d grown up, and the taunts she’d suffered from the mouths of both her family and her so-called Christian neighbors.  Whispers of fear that introduced the nightmares, drove her to hide behind the walls of her house, now came screeching back, rooting her to her spot as she fought to quell her rising nausea.  How could I forget? she wondered helplessly.  How could I ever forget?

“I-I-I really need to p-p-pay for these,” she stuttered, and inwardly screamed at how easily the frightened little girl came back.  All because of a couple of no-brain hicks who didn’t understand one single thing about what it meant to be evil.  And yet…she didn’t move.

“What kind of spell you plannin’ on casting, baby girl?” the older man asked.  “A love spell?  There a boy you’re trying to seduce to the dark forces of the devil, too?”  She flinched when he reached out and brushed her cheek, and couldn’t help the whimper that squeaked in her throat.  “All you girls are after---.”

“Am I missing some sort of party here, pet?”

Never had the sound of Spike’s voice sent such a rush of pleasure through her body, and Tara’s head jerked up, her breathing quickening in anticipation of the freedom he represented as the blond vampire stepped up behind Daryl.  His head was tilted, his thumbs hooked through his belt loops, and at that exact moment in time, he looked like an angel to her.

“We was just havin’ ourselves a little chat with the lady here,” the older man said defensively, his gaze sweeping over Spike in disgust.  “Just mosey along there.”  He pointed to the opposite end of the store.  “I believe the eighties are thataway.”

He and Daryl shared a snicker as Spike just rolled his eyes.  “Guess it must Junior’s day to be having the brain.”

When it became obvious the blond wasn’t moving, both men turned away from Tara to square off with him.  “I believe you were told to vamoose,” Daryl said.  “Don’t make us get physical.”

“Now that would be interestin’ to see.  Haven’t had a decent spot of violence in a good twelve hours.”  Spike ducked as the first punch was thrown, watching as the older man went sprawling when his fist connected with air.  He shook his head in disdain.  “Now that was just pathetic.”

When Daryl’s fist shot out, the vampire stopped it with his own open grip, using the man’s momentum to propel him sideways, tossing him into his friend so that the two tangled in a heap.  His face was grim, eyes flashing gold as he surveyed their struggle to get up, lashing out with a heavy boot when Daryl managed to get to his knees.

“Guess you don’t like pickin’ on people your own size,” Spike said coldly.  “I’d make you apologize to the lady, but somehow, I don’t think you’d mean it.”

Only when the two men stumbled out of the store, Daryl clutching at his sore ribs, was Tara able to move again.  The breath she’d been holding came out in a ragged exhale, but before she could thank Spike for his intervention, the clerk behind the counter spoke up.

“Thanks for saving me the trouble of calling my dad,” she said gratefully, though her finger casually held her place on the page of her magazine.  “He hates it when those guys show up.  They always make a mess of the place.”

Spike’s eyebrows shot up.  “They’re regulars?”

“In the crazy, we hate everything magical and therefore we must ruin it for everyone else, kind of way.  Yeah.  Thanks for not making them brunch, too.  I’m really not in the mood to be mopping up blood this morning.”

The latter made both Tara and Spike pause, albeit for different reasons.  “You know I’m a vampire?” he asked the clerk.

“Well, duh.  The smoking blanket kind of gave you away.”

“And you’re not scared?”

With a heavy sigh, the girl reached down behind the counter and extracted a large cross and water pistol.  “Holy water,” she said in explanation.  “I’m covered.”

“S-s-so, those guys…they’re…not demons?”  Seeing Spike hurt them had made her automatically assume they were.  If they weren’t…

“Nope.  Just your garden variety jerk-off humans.”  The clerk gestured toward the items that Tara still clutched to her chest.  “You ready for me to start ringing you up?”

She didn’t even hear the girl’s words.  As she watched, Spike turned away, reaching into his pocket for his cigarette and lighter, pointedly ignoring the “No Smoking” sign emblazoned along the wall as he quickly lit one up.  Some of it made sense now.  In the cosmicly ironic definition of the word.  His jitteriness last night.  His quick disappearance when the fight started heating up between Buffy and Xander.  It might even account for some of his good mood this morning.

Surprisingly enough, though, it didn’t scare her.  He’d had more than enough opportunities to act on it, and hadn’t.  He had, in fact, defended her, protected her.

But she still had to know for sure.

Dumping her things to the counter, Tara approached him cautiously, reaching out to touch the worn leather of his sleeve when he tried to turn away.  “The chip?” she asked tremulously.

It took forever for him to answer.  When he did, his head was bowed, his gaze watching the ash on his cigarette sift to the ground before being scattered by the fan of the air conditioning vents.

“Gone,” was all Spike said.

*************

He felt like tearing something apart with his bare fingers, as if his sudden freedom from the chip meant he had to spend every waking opportunity destroying the tangible.  Instead, Spike drummed his fingers along the steering wheel, torn between wishing the windows weren’t blacked out so that he could see her emerge from the magic shop and grateful that they were so that he wouldn’t have to see her face when she did.

Having the witch find out about his missing chip had not been on his agenda for the day.  Spike had woken up wrapped around Buffy, and though the prospect of telling her had niggled along his spine with millipede legs, knowing how she felt about him made it seem more likely that she wouldn’t hold his returned power against him.  So he’d gloried in how she felt in his embrace, her curves melded to him in a perfect fit, the sultry scent of her skin enticing him to run the tip of his tongue along the side of her neck. 

Even in her sleep, she’d reacted.  With a small squirm of her bottom into his hard cock, she’d sighed as he relished the tickly texture of the tiny hairs at her nape as they stood on end, stretching her neck forward to allow him easier access.  Blunt teeth nibbled at the muscles, and Spike had slipped his hand between the heat of her thighs, coaxing them to part until the musk of her arousal filled his nostrils. 

Ambrosia.  That’s what it was.  More so than anything else.  Just as the words, I love you, were stronger chains than any piece of hardware shoved inside him could ever be.

It made his mouth water, slick as he began sucking at her flesh, long fingers parting her outer lips to penetrate the wetness of her slit with a gentle thrust.  Buffy had moaned then, the corner of her mouth lifting.

“Morning,” she’d murmured, and reached behind her to float over the topography of his muscles as though touching him would somehow destroy the spell he was weaving with his tongue and fingers.

His only response was to flick his thumb over her clit, smiling into her skin when she bucked against him.

“Not fair.”  It came through the beginning of a pant, and the glimpse of her tongue darting out to lick her lips made Spike growl in response.  “I have to…Anya…you know…” she’d continued, coherence failing her in light of the trembling that seemed to be overtaking her muscles.

“Doesn’t have to take long,” he’d said, and would’ve been inside her in a flash if the bloody phone hadn’t decided to ring at that exact moment.  His hand had grabbed hers as she reached to answer it, and it had taken all his will to keep the pleading tone out of his voice as he spoke.  “Don’t answer it.  Just…let it go.”

“I can’t.  You know that.”  No recriminations.  Just the resignation of what she accepted as her life, hope that he would understand as she picked up the receiver.

He’d laid back, just watching the golden arc of her back as she spoke hurriedly with her Watcher, confirming their plans and assuring him she would be in his room in five minutes.  When she’d finished, she’d quickly swiveled to drop her mouth to his, her kiss hard but brief.

“This place has a pool,” she’d breathed, pulling away to look into his eyes.  “I think I might be convinced to go for a nighttime swim or something.  To…unwind from the day.”

“Still don’t see why I can’t go with you,” he’d said, running his hand up the inside of her thigh.  “Think I proved last night I’m healed up enough.  And don’t pull out your daylight excuse again because that one doesn’t hold water any more, not when I made it across this bleedin’ country in near record time.  What’s the point of gettin’ a second gris gris if you’re not goin’ to let me use it?”

“You’re right.  You are well enough to fight, and as much as I love to watch you move…”  She’d slapped away his straying hand, shaking her head with a smile at his knowing smirk.  “…I still need for you to stay here.  Tara wants to do those spells she was talking about.  I think last night’s fiasco at Midnight proved that none of us can really afford to be left alone right now, and if I had to pick someone to protect her, you are most definitely my number one choice.”

She’d dropped another kiss on his unsuspecting lips then and scurried off, leaving him awash in unexpected pride.  That was where he’d remained, drifting between fantasies of taking her every way possible and the self-satisfaction in hearing her trust in him spoken so eloquently.

The arrival of the witch had jerked him from his reverie, and he’d just sat there, uncaring of his semi-nakedness, and listened to her explain that she needed some supplies and would be right back so he could go ahead and rest some more until she returned. 

“It’s not far,” Tara had said.  “And it’s a beautiful day.  I’m just going to walk---.”

“Are you completely daft?” Spike had shot back.  “In this city?  No offense, but you’re not the Slayer, kitten, and if you think for a second I’m goin’ to let you risk that neck of yours over something as ridiculous as an eye of newt refill, you’re not as smart as I gave you credit for.”  Bunching the sheet around his waist, he’d risen from the bed and stalked off to the bathroom.  “Need some burba weed anyway,” he’d grumbled, striving to make it seem more casual than it originally sounded.  “Just hold on there while I get dressed.”

His good mood had prevailed, even after they’d arrived at the magic shop.  It was only when he’d heard the tosser comment on how “interesting” Tara was, and then felt the accompanying acceleration of Tara’s heartbeat, did Spike’s sense of amity dissolve. Let those wankers try and pull some of their misplaced misogynistic anger on one of his girls?  Not bloody likely.  His reaction had been automatic, his delight in seeing them suffer even just a little bit---though he would’ve much preferred to pull their entrails out through their noses---blinding him for the split second before he realized he’d just given himself away.  It might’ve been all right if the big-mouthed bint behind the counter had just kept her mouth closed.

But now Tara knew.  And Buffy didn’t.

And Spike was sitting in his Desoto, stewing in his own juices, torn between berating himself for being terrified of what the mousy little witch might do and furious that he was in the position in the first place.

His head thumped against the headrest in frustration.

Damn it all to hell.

The back door opened first, and he glanced in the rearview mirror to watch her slide the bag of supplies onto the seat.  Her eyes darted up to meet where his would’ve been if they’d reflected, and Spike saw the indecision hover there briefly before she pulled out and shut the door.

Seconds later, she was sliding across the front seat, buckling herself into place.

He didn’t know if he should speak first, or if she wanted to, or if she was planning on ignoring the whole thing, or if…

Fuck.  Too many ifs.  Since when did dealing with humans get to be so damn hard?

“Thank you for what you…did in there,” Tara said, breaking the uncomfortable silence that had settled between them.  “Those kind of guys…I know I sh-sh-shouldn’t…they just…”

Spike waved a hand in dismissal, her obvious discomfort in reliving the recent memory just as bothersome to him, for some reason.  “Don’t have to say a word,” he said.  “Wouldn’t do if something were to happen to you, too.  Buffy’d never forgive me.”

“Does she…know?”

She didn’t have to elaborate.  He knew exactly what she was talking about.  “No.”  He frowned as he risked glancing over at her.  “Why aren’t you fussed about it?”

“Should I be?”

It was the ingenuousness of her response that made him chuckle.  “Just strikes me this side of funny, kitten.  In there, it was lookin’ like you wished the Hellmouth itself would open up and swallow you down whole just because two yokels with a teaspoon of brain between them decide to play Deputy Dawg for the magic set.  Yet, you find out my muzzle’s gone and you climb into the front seat next to me like there’s nothin’ wrong.  Makes a bloke more than a mite curious.”

“It’s not so weird if you think about it.”  She began ticking them off on her fingers.  “You could’ve attacked me at the hotel and you didn’t.  You could’ve attacked me any time on the car ride here, and you didn’t.  You could’ve eaten those guys in there, and you didn’t.  You could’ve---.”

He waved her silent.  “You can stop.  I think I got the picture.  Any more, and you’ll make me sound like Mother fucking Teresa.”

“Do you think Buffy would stake you if she found out?  Is that why she doesn’t know yet?”

“She doesn’t know because I’ve only just found out for myself,” Spike replied.  “Last night.  Then, when everything hit the fan back at the hotel…didn’t seem like the best time to be springing it on her, if you know what I mean.”

“But you’re going to tell her, right?  This isn’t something you can really keep from her, not…you know, now.”

Now.  Another stolen glance confirmed for him what he’d already suspected.  Tara was just too damn perceptive for her own good, and he was terrible at keeping a secret.  Reaching for the pack of cigarettes on the dashboard, he ripped at the wrapper, the cellophane crackling too loudly in the close confines of the car as he pulled a single stick from the packaging.  “Are all you witches mindreaders?” he asked irritably. The tip of the cigarette flared in a sudden crisp as he lit it, and Spike inhaled deeply.  “I’m beginning to think it’s a conspiracy.”

Tara’s eyes went wide.  “Me?  Clairvoyant.  Oh, no.”  She paused, unable to keep from smiling.  “But, Spike…I do know the difference between a burn mark and a hickey.”

Her tease caught him completely off-guard, and Spike sputtered around his cigarette, causing Tara to lean over and pat him firmly on the back as if to clear his lungs.  When he looked at her again, it was with renewed respect, the corner of his own mouth canting to mirror her grin.

“Next time, warn a fella that you’re goin’ to surprise the shit out of him,” he said.  “I think I almost swallowed my cig there for a second.”

The mirth that radiated from her gaze eased, and she let her hand drop back down into her lap.  “I’m serious, though,” she said.  “Buffy doesn’t like secrets.  Especially when they’re being kept from her.  I may not have known her for very long, but---.”

“I know I’ve gotta tell her,” he interrupted, his voice solemn in the small space.  “Just…not…lookin’ forward to it.”

“It’ll be worse if you wait.  It’s best to just get it over with, I think.”

“Why?  So she can go back to hating me?”  The venom in his voice surprised even him.  “Not that fighting her isn’t its own reward, but…that’s what not what I want anymore.  Not…fuck…this wasn’t s’posed to happen like this.”

“Which part?”  Her own voice was a contrast of softness.  “The me finding out, or the you falling in love with Buffy?”

He stared at her in amazement, his cigarette forgotten between his fingers.  It sounded different being spoken aloud, and especially more so by someone who wasn’t him.  Or the Slayer. 

Spike.  In love with Buffy. 

The Big Bad---OK, so that was a misnomer anymore, but hell if it didn’t still give him a warm feeling somewhere deep inside to believe it---ready to lay down his unlife for the Slayer and her friends.

Time to stop running away from the truth and face it head on, consequences be damned.

I’m in love with Buffy.

When he didn’t respond right away, Tara asked, “How long has it been gone?  Since…before you left?”

“Not sure,” Spike admitted.  “But something that seer said last night makes me think it was whoever our mystery guest was yesterday.  I think our little Cecily wannabe showed up wantin’ to give me back my fangs and added just a little too much juice to the mojo so that I healed up quicker, too.”

She looked stricken.  “Oh, goddess,” she breathed.  “This is all my fault then.  I’m the one who let her in.”

Her guilt took him by surprise, and the vampire looked up at her incredulous.  “Is there anything you don’t feel responsible for?” he asked.  “It’s got nothin’ to do with you.  Whoever it was had a plan, and I hate to break it you, but if they had enough juice to take that bloody chip out, there’s no snowball’s chance in hell you would’ve been able to do anything about it.”

“But…I let her…it…in.  Maybe---.”

“Maybe nothin’.  It’s done, it’s out, and there’s no more cryin’ over what we can’t change.”  He snorted, shaking his head as he took another long drag from his cigarette.  “Listen to me.  Pontificating with the worst of them.  Think that poet’s tryin’ to squirm his way free again.”

“Poet?”

“Nothin’.  Never mind.”  Absently, he ground the butt out into the ashtray, and cast one last look over at Tara.  Nothing in her demeanor conveyed anything but concern for him, no pressing herself against the door in fear, no anxiety reflected back at him in her eyes.  Her hands lay open and relaxed in her lap, and her gaze remained steady on his face.  “Are you…”  Hell, why was this so hard?  “…goin’ to tell her?” Spike asked.

She shook her head, a small smile on her lips.  “It’s not my story to tell,” she replied.  “And I know it’s scary, but if you think about it, it’s kind of exciting, too.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I mean it.  It’s like…this is a chance for you to be something new.  Something…different.  Something better.”  Her voice grew more wistful as she spoke, a faraway look overtaking her eyes.  “Because there’s somebody there who’s showing you, just by loving you, that you have a choice.  You don’t have to follow a specific path if you don’t want to.  Even if the other way looks good, or easier, you now get to decide for yourself what you want.  So, yeah.  I think it’s exciting.  Maybe not apocalypse-y exciting, but still…”

She blushed when she realized his gaze was intent, and began playing with the strap of her purse.  “We should probably head back to the hotel.  I won’t have time to get anything done before the others come back if we don’t get on the road now.”

Curtly, Spike nodded, and settled his hand on the keys on the ignition.  The fluttering underneath his skin still remained, the desire to do anything---be anywhere but here---but drive back to the hotel only to wait to hear the Slayer pass sentence on him once she knew the truth still curdling within him.  But the witch had a point, even if he knew she was mostly talking about herself than anything else.

It was like that seer said. 

He had a choice.  The decision rested with him.

And he wasn’t about to start disappointing Buffy now by making the wrong one.

*************

Trudging through the tunnels carried with it a mixture of emotions---the nausea from the stench that swirled from the water and raw sewage around their ankles, the nervousness about the anticipation of getting this whole fiasco with Willow and Anya fixed, and the oddest one of all, remembered desire as she recalled memories of the last time she’d gone through these sewers, following Spike only to end up being kissed and touched in ways that flamed her even now.

Of course, the desire was quickly fading the more she had to listen to Xander complain behind her.

“For someone who spent most of last night and all of this morning blaming himself for Anya’s current predicament,” Giles finally said, exasperation edging his voice, “you are spending far too much time bemoaning the means we opt to get her back, Xander.”

“It’s not bemoaning,” he countered.  “It’s be-holding my nose-ing.  And what I don’t get is why you two are so eager to have a repeat performance of Buffy’s brush with Joe Law.”

“It’s not going to happen this time,” Buffy said, shifting the weight of the sword she’d snagged from Giles’ trunk.  “Last time, I didn’t know how to get out.  This time, we’re all escape route-friendly if we get interrupted.”

“And we learned nothing from our search outside,” the Watcher further clarified.   “Are you so eager to give up on Anya that you’re not willing to try this out?”

“No, of course not,” Xander said.  “But not twelve hours ago, Buffy was ripping us a new one for coming around here, and now she’s leading the hit parade?  I guess I’m just not seeing the logic behind this.”

“We’re just taking a quick peek,” she said.  “Just to confirm whether or not Anya’s there.  In and out.  No harm, no foul.”

“From the way Anya talks,” Giles muttered, “I would’ve thought that was a rhythm you’d understand.”

Buffy’s eyes widened at the sarcasm that dripped from his voice and had to fight to stifle the giggle that rose in her throat, grateful that Xander hadn’t seemed to notice what was said.  This particular recon was really a last resort, only suggested when after talking to every shop owner within a two-block radius had given them absolutely nothing.  No mysterious screaming in the middle of the night.  No dark shadows dragging a girl of Anya’s description down the street.  Nada.  And desperate times called for desperate measures.

“What happens next?” Xander asked, picking his way around an awkward curve, the crossbow bumping against his back.  “Provided we come out of this with the proverbial bupkiss, what’s next on the agenda?”

“We go back and see if Spike and Tara came up with anything,” Buffy said.

“And I’d very much like to go over those cryptic remarks that seer said to you,” Giles offered.  “Perhaps there are some clues in there as to how we should proceed.”

“Great,” Xander said under his breath.  “Nothing like the concrete to vague this up even more.”

Stopping in her tracks, Buffy whirled to face off with the young man, startling him to a halt when he almost bumped into her.  “What’s with the attitude, Xan?” she demanded.  “You’ve been all doom and gloom ever since we left the hotel.  Is there something else you’d like to say to me?  Something that you didn’t say last night?”

She wasn’t still mad at him.  After the amazing night with Spike, confessing to him what she’d only just confessed to herself---and how hard was it for her to leave him this morning when there was so much more she wanted to say---Buffy had woken up realizing that her friends had done what they had thought was best, well-intentioned if a little misguided, and had decided to let it go.  The problem was, while Giles and Tara seemed fine with moving on, Xander didn’t.  Every step, every word, every grimace on his face was screaming at her that something was still wrong, and she was tired of waiting for him to tell her what it was.

His brown eyes, when they met hers, seemed to overwhelm his face, wide and hurting as his voice remained somber.  “It’s not you,” he assured quietly.  “It’s me.  All of this.  I’m the one who got Anya in trouble last night.  I’m the one who freaked Anya out in the first place when all this mess started.  I’m just…it would be nice if maybe something I touched didn’t curl up and die like something that got left in the fridge for too long.  I’m tired of being the bad guy here.  I just…”  His voice finally broke, and he looked down as he kicked at the water that swilled around his feet.  “I want them back.  Whatever it takes.  Both of them.  I don’t know what I’d do without them, Buffy.”

Guilt for not understanding softened her stance, and the Slayer took a step forward and laid a small hand on her friend’s arm.  “We’ll get them back,” she said.  “I promise.  If I have to---.”

“Sshhh,” Giles warned.

Frowning, the two younger people turned to see the Watcher staring down the tunnel in the direction from which they’d come, his eyes narrowed behind his spectacles as he cocked his head.  It was then they heard it, the unmistakable sound of splashing.  Feet splashing, moving closer to them.  Coming through the tunnels just as they had.

“Get back,” Buffy said in a low voice, and raised the sword as she crept toward the bend in the tunnel.

When the three vampires rounded the corner, they stopped dead in their tracks, their eyes widening when they saw a ready Slayer waiting for them.  “Shit,” she heard one of them mutter before relaxing from her stance.

“Oh,” she said brightly.  “And here I thought it might be something hard to kill sneaking up on us.  Silly me.”

“Where’s your boyfriend, Slayer?” the largest of the trio taunted.  Someone had obviously turned him some time during the height of Seattle grunge, she decided, taking in the “Corporate magazines still suck” slogan emblazoned across his chest with Kurt Cobain’s picture underneath.

“Yeah,” said the smaller vamp just to his left.  “Spike sure got himself crispified.  You looking for the same---.”

He exploded in a cloud of dust, the stake splashing to the ground, before he could finish his sentence.  The two remaining vampires looked at each other, and then a little more warily at Buffy.

“Does either one of you want to finish what your friend was saying?” she said brightly.  “Because, really, listening to you guys remind me how much I hate your boss?  Great incentive to make killing you hurt all that much more.”

They rushed her en masse, and Buffy brought her leg around to send Grungy flying through the air toward Xander and Giles.  That left her squared off with the third of the group, a beefy guy who probably was all forehead even without being in vamp face, but as she raised her sword to fight, he kicked at the water, splashing it up into her face so that it momentarily blinded her.

Buffy grunted when the vamp tackled her, throwing her against the wall as her weapon went flying from her grip.  “So, we’re playing dirty, huh?” she asked.  “I can do that.”

Using his hold on her as leverage, she pulled herself tighter against him to close their proximity, her knee jerking up as their torsos touched.  It connected with his groin with all her force behind it, and he wheezed as he slumped against her in pain, his hands dropping from where he was holding her to clutch at his crotch.

“Told you I could do it,” Buffy said.  As he stumbled backwards, trying to get out of her reach, she shook her head.  “Oh, no, you don’t,” she warned, and grabbed the hem of his jacket.

It only stopped him momentarily.  As soon as he felt the pull on his coat, the vampire curled back his shoulders so that the garment fell from his body, leaving it to hang limply in the Slayer’s hands.

“Crap,” she muttered, dropping it to the ground.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Xander and Giles struggling with Grungy.  Still standing and still have weapons, she noted.   OK.  Concentrate on mine.

He was staggering from the pain in his privates, but he still stood between Buffy and her sword.  Her stake, however, was another matter, and she darted forward to pluck it from the wet mush that had been the first demon she’d dusted.  The splash it made was audible, and her target ducked just as she leapt forward, forcing her to correct her trajectory before slamming into the opposite wall.

She didn’t have time to turn when she felt him thrust her forward, and braced herself for the contact with the cement.  It winded her only for a second, but his body pressed against hers made moving away momentarily impossible.  Well, she thought, if he won’t move on his own, I’ll have to do the moving for him.

A stomp of her foot on his was followed immediately a reverse head butt, the back of her skull meeting his chin.  Before he could get too far away, though, the Slayer had whirled and plunged the stake into his chest, the dust taking longer to settle from the air due to the increased moisture.

When she turned to help the others, she was greeted with their panting bodies, Xander bent over and wheezing as Giles leaned heavily against the wall.  Grungy was nowhere to be seen.

“Cool,” she said brightly.  “I didn’t even hear him scream when you killed him.”

“That would be because he ran away,” Giles managed.  He gestured abstractly in the direction they’d originally been heading.  “That way,” he said between heavy breaths.

Her good mood faded.  “Damn.  I guess that rules out heading to Midnight ourselves.  I guess you got your wish, Xander.”

The brunette straightened, and Buffy saw the beginnings of a black eye darkening his face.  “Sorry he got away,” he said.  “He was slipperier than he looked.”

“No big.  We should probably be heading back anyway.”  Taking the weapons from their hands to ease their travel, Buffy turned away and began walking back down the tunnel.  She stopped, though, when something white floated away from the discarded vampire coat.  “Hey,” she said, pointing at it with her toe.  “Can one of you pick that up and see what it is?  My hands are a little full here.”

Gingerly, Giles bent over and extracted the item, shaking it slightly to reveal a limp piece of paper.  His eyes narrowed as he scanned the outside, and tightened even further when he unfolded it and looked at its contents.

“What is it?” Xander asked, coming up to look over the Englishman’s shoulder.

“A note.  To Freddie,” Giles answered.

Buffy frowned.  “That’s the guy who kidnapped Willow.  What’s it say?”

He shook his head.  “The water’s made the ink run.  Most of it is illegible.”

“Can you read any of it?”

“The only thing that is perfectly clear is the signature.”  His eyes met hers.  “It’s from Willow.”

*************

He heard the crashing long before anyone appeared, and stood ready by the liquor cabinet, Anya shrinking back into the couch behind him, when the vampire appeared through the opening from the tunnels.  Freddie immediately frowned, grimacing as the stench from the sewers followed the demon in, and stepped as far away as he could from the new arrival while keeping himself between him and Anya.

“Is there something hard about usin’ the door?” he complained loudly.  “I find it tends to be a little less messy, a little less stinky when you do.”

“Slayer,” the vampire wheezed, pulling an arrow awkwardly from its leg.  “Right behind me.”

“Figures,” Freddie said, and turned to see the look of triumph on Anya’s face.

“I told you something like this would happen,” she said loudly.

Shaking his head, Freddie set about pounding on the outer door.  “Open it up!” he called out.  “We got us a situation.”  He waited until it was cracked ajar and pointed back at the other vampire.  “He says the Slayer’s on her way.  I suggest you get a car around so that I can get Sandrine’s little guest out of here.”

“The Slayer?”  The guard looked from him to the other vampire in the room.  “Are you sure about that?”

“Would I be standing here bleeding all over Iris’ floor if it wasn’t serious enough to be the Slayer?” Grungy announced petulantly.

That settled it.  Pushing the door open even further, the guard stepped aside.  “Get her out front.  I’ll make the call.”

“I told you so,” Anya repeated to Freddie triumphantly.

Roughly, he grabbed her arm and began dragging her from the room.  “Say that one more time and I swear I’ll slap you senseless,” he threatened as they disappeared into the hallway.

*************

From behind him, Halfrek watched as D’Hoffryn shut down the image of the events going on in New Orleans.  “I guess you underestimated Anyanka’s loyalty to her new friends,” she said lightly.

“I think I’ve underestimated all of the Slayer’s friends’ loyalty,” he mused quietly.  “Although Anyanka’s presence certainly will speed up their summoning of Sira.  Which means I will have the voix mortelle all that much sooner.”

“But you heard her.  The Slayer’s determined to put a stop to it all, and she was right there.  Perhaps your little plan for William didn’t work.”

Slowly, he looked over his shoulder, his gaze cold and steady.  “You’re not questioning my methods, are you, Halfrek?” he quizzed.

Her hands jumped nervously to play with the locket around her neck.  “Of course not.  I just meant---.”

“I know what you meant.”  D’Hoffryn turned away.  “And don’t worry.  Everything will work out.  The vampire won’t be able to deny his true nature for long.  He’s killed two Slayers already.  The opportunity to add a third to his resume will be too strong to resist.  And then, Buffy Summers will be too busy trying to contain him to pay any attention to my little interest.”  Unseen to her, he smiled.  “Everything will work out…”