Fumbling Towards Ecstasy

((Pete Seeger) - The Byrds - 1965
Normally, I would try to pick part of the song that seemed most appropriate, but how do you cut any of this?

Chapter 5.03

Buffy's hand came up to cover Spike's lips as the first tentative knock on the bedroom door, scant feet away from where she was pinned against the wall, was followed by Tara's voice.

"Buffy, Spike, are you guys up?"

The slayer bit her own lip until she could regain enough control to speak, as Spike continued to demonstrate that he was very much up, his movements lifting her repeatedly off the leg that had been intermittently touching the ground rather than being hooked over his hip.

"I was just about to start breakfast and I didn't know if you guys wanted any."

"We're, em, just coming..." Buffy called back with difficulty, pressing down even harder over Spike's mouth to prevent him vocalising the snicker she could read in his eyes. "Stick ours in the oven and we'll be down as soon as we grab a shower."

Any attempt at discretion was for nothing, however, as the pair crashed to the floor in a clattering tangle of limbs moments later.

* * * * *

A bleary-eyed slayer looked up from the couch when Tara made her way through the living room. "Are those guys always that noisy, or were they just trying to kill the girl who hasn't slept in forty eight hours?"

Tara smiled, and then went on to check the contents of the fridge and the kitchen cupboards as she answered. "It kinda depends... Normally, there's one sorta noisy one, just after they go to bed and then they try to keep it down a bit. Then, other times, I think they seem to forget they're not alone and it gets to be sort of a competition... He makes her scream so she tries to make him yell even louder..."

"And it doesn't bother you?"

"Not since I invested in some earplugs... and it shouldn't be an issue once they get the conversion done on the basement."

"And what does the kid make of it all?"

"I think compared with how Buffy was... before... Let's just say she likes to see her sister happy."

"That doesn't sound like the poison dwarf I remember, running to Joyce every time Buffy skipped a class."

"Heyyyy! Taller than you, and I was like twelve or something and you and Buffy kept ditching me.

Have a good night's sleep, F? Or did mom come back and haunt you for holding her hostage, seeing as how you were sleeping in the very spot where she died?" Dawn asked as she stalked through the living room on her high horse.

The pyjama-wearing teen grinned as Faith visibly blanched. "Guess nobody told you that last night, huh? Darn shame."

"I think the things that were going bump in the night were a bit more corporeal than your mom, twiglet," Faith drawled to hide her discomfort.

"Going boink, don't you mean?" Dawn pulled a couple of pieces of bright yellow foam from her pocket. "Gee, and I didn't think to offer you any of these, either. Or wait, no, I did remember. I just decided not to. Aren't I the poor hostess? But wait, that would be with guests rather than unwanted escaped murderers."

"Dawnie..." Tara's voice was a gentle reprimand. "Faith came here to help."

"Yeah, great, and she did, so isn't it time now for her to go? Or wait, maybe it would be more fun to wait till the police get bored leaving messages on the answering machine and come round in person? I mean... Buffy would have to tell them that you were holding us hostage because if she said that we had an escaped felon as an invited guest, I'm thinking it wouldn't be good for the custody issue."

"And I'm thinking," Buffy spoke from just behind the younger Summers. She was fully dressed but her wet hair had simply been drawn into a ponytail. "...That since my sister seems to have been replaced by some sort of evil changeling that maybe the custody thing isn't the whole big issue that I might have thought it was. Capisce?" Buffy asked in her best "firm mommy" voice.

"Allll-right," the teen grudgingly conceded.

"So? Are you okay for school today or not?"

"Tomorrow?" Dawn pleaded. "It's not like I really got a chance to do any of those assignments yesterday and last week of term half the teachers won't even be teaching anything anyway."

"You stay home today and you will spend the whole day on those assignments until it's time to go see Mr Hamilton who I must call later this morning, 'cause Spike will watch you while I'm out... and there won't be any visitors tonight, either, unless they're all finished."

"Deal," Dawn agreed so easily that Buffy suspected that there was unlikely to be more than a couple of hours work needed on the outstanding homework, but then from what Buffy remembered of the last week of term even if she was in school it seemed likely that she would learn more about hangman than anything else. "So where ya goin'?"

"I've got some errands to run, just little bits and pieces... and I said I'd try to go see Will. I shouldn't be long if I borrow Spike's car. Anyone heard from Wes or Giles this morning?"

"Aren't you supposed to have a qualified driver in the car with you?"

"Are you my little sister or my mother? Go make yourself useful and call Xander and tell him he doesn't have to take you to school today. Wes? Giles?"

"Nada," Tara replied. "Should there be?"

"Would have been nice. I'll take a stroll across the street after breakfast, see if there's any news." She shrugged as if it were no big deal, as if treating it lightly would mean that a girl's life didn't depend on what the former watchers and their estranged organisation had achieved and what they could achieve over the next few hours. "Spike and I had another vision last night. Only, this time, if the council can pull it off, there's a chance we might be in time... But then we are talking about the council... And it seems like if this girl was already in training, she'd be kinda distinctive... so it really shouldn't be taking them like six hours to find her... not unless she's like me, where the council didn't catch up until after I was called... but then, it doesn't make sense that The First can find baby slayers that the council can't... or does it?"

"No word, I'm guessin' then." Spike appeared from the basement, barefoot and wearing only jeans and a royal blue shirt that he had yet to get round to buttoning, the sound of the washing machine churning in the background revealing what he had been doing. "...An' your council couldn't find their own arses half the time without a road map."

"Heyyy!" Both slayers objected in unison, not to his assessment of the council's competence but to any implication that they might be connected to it.

* * * * *

Buffy pulled away from in front of the house. She had left this call till last as she had suspected the house's tenants would not be early risers. The morning had been eaten up, having already spent an hour with Willow and another half an hour with the florist, arranging a little wedding day surprise for Spike. It had been three years since she had been to the house and in the intervening period she had exchanged only an occasional word with any of those she had hoped still occupied it. Still, it had seemed like the best lead she had... There had been only one other possible avenue of investigation if this one hadn't worked out... And it wasn't as if she couldn't justify the visit under the guise of wedding preparations... It was just that her mission seemed a little more urgent given the present circumstances. She just hadn't expected the trail to lead to Canada, but then, an email would reach there just as easily as anywhere else and if she was right, then the guy she was looking for would have come back even if he'd been in the African jungle or watching penguins in an Antarctic igloo.

* * * * *

"So do you want to tell her the good news or shall I?" Wes asked the other former watcher, as the DeSoto pulled back up alongside the house on the other side of the street.

"Which good news would that be?" Giles asked, tipping back the last quarter inch from the bottom of the crystal whisky tumbler Wes had provided. "The fact that the mystery of the missing candidate was solved when we discovered that up until four hours ago she was actually every bit as blonde as Spike? Or the fact she, her watcher and every other council member and identified candidate in the entire world are either en route or being rounded up for Quentin's invasion of Sunnydale?"

"Well, since Nathan only discovered her new and exciting hair colour when he picked her up to go to the airport as part of the general exodus, I would say that the two pieces of news were directly linked."

"Either way, I think as both her most recent and her longest serving watcher that the news should come from me." Giles placed his empty glass on Wes's new coffee table and began to move toward the front door.

"What I don't understand," Wes said, "is what Quentin hopes to achieve from this. Surely bringing all the candidates here will simply make it easier for the First to concentrate its efforts?"

"I long ago gave up trying to work out what Quentin was thinking when he does anything. The reptilian brain is just too far removed from our own."

"Let's just hope that there's more behind his plan than the possibility of irritating Buffy to death and thereby activating a new slayer."

* * * * *

"He's trying to irritate me to death. That's it! Next vision, we just keep our mouths shut... And where are they going to go, huh? And does he really think he can give that whack job the poison to kill my boyfriend one week and then turn up on my doorstep the next? And you," Buffy sniffed Giles' breath. "...It's barely lunchtime and you've been drinking spirits already."

"W-Well," Giles stuttered defensively. "It's not like it's every day you find out that your all time least favourite employer is following you all the way across the Atlantic... and it was just the one. You Americans really take this paranoia-."

"Keep it up."

"Wh-What are you suggesting?" Giles gave Buffy a puzzled stare.

"I'm suggesting that you go with Spike. You take the two bottles of single malt that I bought this morning and the Jack Daniels for when you're past the point where you can appreciate the good stuff..." She held up a hand as Giles appeared to want to interrupt. "Spike gave me a shopping list of possibles and I gave the cashier at that upmarket liquor store on Freeman a good-sized chunk of plastic, so if you want to complain, tell Spike his taste sucks, not me. Angel stayed over at Spike's place last night and he's agreed to stay until you guys at least try to sort out your differences... And since the only time I can remember you loosening your damned English stiff upper lip without having repeated sex on the hood of a police car with my mom, was the time you tried to drown your sorrows at Spike calling you a retired librarian, I'm advocating that you and Angel get roaring drunk with Spike as referee and fight or bond or whatever it is that drunks do until this is settled. And since it would appear that the British are once more a comin', I suggest you do it now, before Quentin has a chance to catch you with the hangover."

"Mom?" Buffy realised her mistake when Dawn's bewildered voice carried through from the dining room where she had been working on Spike's computer, whereas, even as Spike abandoned his supervisory role and came through to join them, his look of shock rapidly turned to one of affection, even if he couldn't help but shake his head in disbelief.

"Knew the lady had wicked style. Still unconvinced about her taste in men, though. Hope you at least bought her flowers."

"You? With mom? In public?" Dawn wasn't about to let this one drop.

"What? No! ...Well, not really... There was only the policeman there and he was still out cold from when I punched him... and I thought we agreed that you were never going to mention that in front of Dawn. There were circumstances. Ethan-."

"What's he got to do with-." Dawn's face curled into an expression of total disgust. "You boffed mom when you were a demon? What if we'd ended up with some tufty-eared, horny little brother. Did you even think about that? Did mom even have a choice? I mean, fine if like Marie or whatever where it's like a lifestyle thing in a proper relationship, but you were horny for one day and you just-just... with mom?"

"Of course she had a choice and-and it wasn't that time. It was the B-Band Candy."

"The Band Candy? That was only supposed to make everyone act younger... not make you jump on my mom like some sort of gigolo. I'm a teenager - you don't catch me having sex on top of police cars."

"Right, Buffy... Single malt, you say? Capital plan. I'll just wait outside while Spike says his goodbyes and fetches the orbs, shall I?"

Spike leaned over from his position in the driver's seat to unlock the door on the passenger side and push it ajar. He barely allowed the former watcher to get in the car before he let loose.

"You're a damned idiot, Rupert. You do know that, don't you?" Spike screeched out of the drive in reverse, barely sparing a glance over his shoulder and offering a two-fingered salute to a driver who dared sound his horn when the black classic suddenly appeared in front of him.

"I beg your pardon!" Giles fell back on chilly, upper crust politeness in face of the vampire's tirade.

"Oh, you can speak a dozen languages and if your IQ hits the double century, I wouldn't be entirely surprised but where it counts you're a right stupid bastard."

Giles' mouth opened as if to make some sort of rebuttal, but Spike hadn't finished, yet.

"So, what the hell did you think you were doing? An' don't tell me it was just 'cause of some hocus pocus as your old buddy did that set things off, or I will punch you into next week. Joyce was a damn lady. Whether she was actin' like Joyce at fifteen or Joyce at fifty she was not some bloody slapper like that bint Grandpa brought up from LA as would jump the bones of the first half decent lookin' bloke she happened to come across.

Now, maybe, if there hadn't been some 'Izzy Wizzy let's get busy' nonsense goin' on then the gits like Hank 'Total Fuckwit' Summers might have got her so far into 'Once bitten, twice shy' mode that they sucked the spontaneity out of her... Maybe, without your magic sweeties nothing would have happened, but did it never! bloody! occur! to you that someone like Joyce, even before that ex of hers stomped all over every romantic dream she ever had, would not have shagged anyone that she didn't bloody care about in some way?

Did you even try to see her afterwards? Send her some flowers, anything to say it wasn't just some stupid mistake? ...Or did you just retreat into your damn tweed armour and try to pretend it didn't happen?"

"Not that I see that it's any of your business, but I suspect that Joyce found my presence rather embarrassing after that, so I stayed out of her way as much as possible for a time."

"Alright, I take it back... You're not an idiot! You're just a total fucking git. Of course she was bloody embarrassed. You'd just shared the most intimate experience your average bloody couple can share. She laid herself open, made herself vulnerable and what does the great bloody watcher do? Treat her like it's a mistake. Treat her like it's no big deal ...like she's some fuckin' tart that shags a different bloke every day."

"It wouldn't have been right to pursue a relationship. As Buffy's watcher, I had to maintain my objectivity-."

"Balls to that! You haven't been objective about Buffy since the first second you laid eyes on her. It's an impossibility for anyone as has ever met her to be objective about her. You can love her. You can hate her guts. You can be driven insane by her. You can do all three at once but you cannot be objective about her.

Okay, so it might not have worked out and it could have got messy, but you damn well owed it to all three of them to give it a shot." As quickly as it had erupted the vampire's anger seemed to evaporate, leaving only sadness.

"You could have tried. You could have made some sort of bloody effort and maybe Joyce wouldn't have had to spend the last years of her life alone... and maybe the girls could have had a real father who was there when they got in at night and when they got up in the morning.

You had a chance with one of the most amazing women it has ever been my privilege and honour to know... and you let her go because you were embarrassed. Worse than that, you gave her one more reason to give up on men altogether...

"Hey, stranger..." Buffy looked up from a rare moment of peace and quiet reading one of her bridal magazines to greet Tara when she surfaced from her room for long enough to have some lunch. "How's it going?"

Buffy frowned. "Anything any of us can do to help? Can't have you flunking out because of all the time you spend helping us."

"When I get to where I need someone to quiz me, I'll take you up on that, provided we don't have another crisis in the meantime... though there is something I need to talk to you about, something that needs setting straight."

"I really fail to see what Buffy hopes to achieve from this. It's not as if we haven't spoken to each other. Perhaps not frequently, but on such occasions as it has been necessary to communicate, we have been able to be civil to each other."

Spike rolled his eyes and turned to the elder vampire. "I don't suppose you want to give the 'kiddies' a few bob and send them out to the pictures or something? They come with sound and everything these days, don't you know? And there's this big glass building in the middle of town. I know you probably thought it was some sort of greenhouse, but turns out it's full of shops... They call that one a mall. And what do you know, some of them even sell clothes in junior's size, 'cause judging by the ripeness of what he's wearing that cheerleader of yours didn't get around to spending all his birthday money before she did her vanishing act."

"Cheerleader was supposed to be gettin' the kid some clothes. I know she bought some stuff for him that day she went out with Buffy, but I doubt even she spent a grand in one afternoon. Didn't you find any cash knockin' around after she did her Shergar impersonation?"

"There was about five hundred bucks, give or take, in the safe," Angel admitted. "...But we thought one of the clients must have coughed up so we stuck it in the business account."

"Well, you can have the love birds there unstick it and go get him enough clothes that he can actually put some in the wash now and then. I would have thought an old-fashioned type like Holtz would've been big on all that cleanliness is next to godliness stuff, but can't say he seems to have passed it on."

The brunette vampire looked decidedly uncomfortable. "We haven't really had time for shopping. We've been busy trying to find Cordy."

"And that's entirely understandable, but you're not goin' to find her in Sunnyhell, so why not let the sidekicks show the kid some fun for a day? Apart from anything else, I kinda doubt you want him to hear what he's goin' to hear if he stays."

"Not that I want to argue, boss, but isn't wandering around a mall in Sunnydale like wearing a sign that says 'Come arrest me'?"

"Not if you actually do up enough buttons on those clothes to make it look a little less like you're open for business." Spike offered helpfully. "Sisko, there, 'll probably draw more attention than you will."

"Remind me again why I was supposed to be helping save your life yesterday," Faith argued back.

"Joyce?" Angel sounded puzzled, and then just decided it was probably best not to know and shook his head. "Just go, Faith. If you wait for Spike to show gratitude, take my word for it, you'll die of old age. Buy a wig, or a baseball cap, get you hair bleached blonde or just sit in the cinema where no one will see you."

Both Gunn and Fred looked over as if they would also like to protest. "You don't want any of us to stick around?" the bald one asked.

"That's kinda irrelevant seein' as, if I need to, I'm like to revoke all your invites until we let you know that this here matter is well and truly settled," Spike told him.

"And that would make a difference how, seein' as we're not the ones who need inviting?"

Spike looked over at Angel, his head tilting slightly to one side and his eyebrow raised. "This guy really arrogant enough to think that if you needed help, with junior and superslut both standin' right here that he'd be the one? Or that if I want him out of here he has a hope in hell of staying?"

Lifting his own brows in a movement reminiscent of the shifting of tectonic plates, Angel raised his left shoulder in a lopsided shrug to the first question and almost cracked a smile at the second. "Gunn, this... is... well, it's private between me and Giles. Spike's only here because... Why are you here?"

"Hey, it's my name, well, one of them, on the rent book. Think I want the watcher here to finish off what he started back in the factory? I'm rather fond of my home not being burned down... An' a certain little lady asked rather nicely." The blond turned and gave Gunn and to a lesser extent Faith a glare that said he had done enough arguing. "So get your coats an' your wally mittens an' wrap up nice an' warm, 'cause if you don't hear from us by nightfall, you best find somewhere else to sleep."

Fred looked like she might ask for an American translation of at least some of what Spike had just said but Angel forestalled her with a single shake of his head.

It was still a full minute before Spike closed the front door of his apartment with an echoing thump mere inches behind the heels of the LA hangers on.

"Just checkin' they aren't all attached by bungee cords or something, goin' to come bouncin' back to protect the poor, defenceless vamp from the big, bad librarian as soon as I break out the whisky."

Angel gave him a scowl that somehow managed to convey irritation and a dry amusement at the same time. "I don't think it's the librarian that they're worried about."

"Don't see why not. Reckon Rupie-bear here's come as close to markin' your card..." There was a brief pause as Spike unloaded a bottle of spirits from both his right and left pockets and pulled out a box of half a dozen crystal tumblers from a cupboard under the counter that divided the kitchen area from the living room. He continued again as he peeled small gold labels from three of the glasses, opened the first bottle and ostentatiously threw the cap into a waste paper basket at the far side of the room before sloshing a generous measure of single malt into each. "...As I ever have, but seein' as he didn't quite manage it I'm guessin' we're goin' to have to do this the hard way."

Giles almost snatched his from the blond's hand. "If it wasn't for the fact I might spill some very good whisky, given the morning... actually, given the time I've had since I set foot in California, I would knock your 'platinum baby' block off ...and, if I hear the words 'Rupie-bear' uttered from anyone's lips other than the owner of the cat to whom they refer, I still will. Are we clear?"

Spike smirked as tiredness and stress brought just a little bit of Ripper to the fore. "Crystal, mate. Crystal.

How about a toast to start us on our way? To the one woman who could get all three of us alone in a room without anyone getting dead or dusted..."

"To Buffy," the other two replied before all three knocked back the contents of their glasses as if it were the cheapest polymalt.

"I could have... and I could have raised a toast to Oliver Cromwell an' all... but I didn't. Live with it."

"You've caught up with all the assignments you missed while you were off... and read all the chapters and everything?" Buffy asked.

"Good thing I called the school this morning and got a list of what you'd be missing today, then." Buffy passed a sheet of paper with a list of further work to her sister. "...But, you can have a one hour break before you start."

"This is not going to achieve anything..." Giles reiterated for around the sixth time.

Tossing the empty whisky bottle into the same receptacle that housed its cap, Spike almost agreed. "Aside from hammering our way through a bottle of whisky that deserved far more leisurely attention, I'm inclined to agree. Figure we need to up the stakes."

Spike pulled out a bottle of JD from one of the kitchen cupboards. Having passed out the last of the first bottle of whisky, he took out three half pint glasses from another cupboard and split the bottle of bourbon between them. "We're goin' to play truth or consequences. Anybody as chickens out of answering a question with complete honesty has to drink two fingers of bourbon down in one. Answer truthfully and you get to ask the next one. Fail to answer and the third guy gets to ask you something instead. Can't ask exactly the same thing twice over, but similar questions are allowed. My decision is final as to what's askin' the same thing. Let's start with caveman brow.

"Well, I guess either that's a forfeit or I could take it that you want to skip the easy questions and go straight to 'Why do you think Buffy believes that Giles would be uncomfortable having you at the wedding?' What d'you say?"

Angel himself looked decidedly uncomfortable before he admitted, "Black." The elder vampire cast a glance in Giles' direction but was too embarrassed to question him so he turned to Spike instead. "Yours?"

"Only in a good way." Spike turned his attention to Giles, his tone more serious. "You know I'll never hurt her, don't you?"

"I... I believe, now, that you care deeply for her. I think she seems to be happier than she has been since Willow and the others brought her back. In time, I might come to have more faith as to the ultimate outcome but for now I'm doing my best to trust Buffy's instincts over my own and accept the situation. You'll forgive me if I say that it all seems to have developed rather quickly and under extreme circumstances and I have to wonder how easily your feelings would turn to bitterness and anger if the relationship were to sour."

Spike gave the former watcher a rueful smile and a nod. "Just wanted to know where I stood. Guess if that's the lay of the land you might want to hang around for a bit to pick up the pieces if you're right."

"Buffy's more than capable of picking up a phone... and I believe under the rules as you described them it was actually my turn to ask a question."

Giles turned his attention to Angel. He seemed to hesitate for a second and then the watcher in him won out over the man. "Why do you believe that you and Darla were able to conceive when to the best of my knowledge such a thing has never happened before in all history?"

Angel shrugged. "I don't know. Ask Wes. He's the one who spent all the time on prophecies and theories. I was too busy trying to look after my son. I guess it's got to be the soul."

Giles shook his head. "Convenient scapegoat as that might be, and even if we were to assume that there were so facile an explanation for your fertility, it doesn't explain how a dead woman was able to bear a child."

Spike sized up Angel, watching every reaction and eventually shrugged. "Don't reckon he's quite coming up with all the theories that might have crossed his mind, but I don't think he really knows anything else either, so no forfeit, but reckon the watcher gets another question."

All eyes turned once more to Giles who in turn still watched Angel. The watcher sipped at his 'good' whisky as he contemplated his next question taking several seconds before he finally spoke. "Did you ever really think when you walked out on Buffy that it was for her own good? Ever believe, deep down in that much vaunted soul of yours, that she could find a human lover who could take the place of the knight in shining armour that you had built yourself up to be in her eyes?" The watcher's gaze pinned the vampire in place as easily as an expert secures his Lepidoptera.

"That... that's not a fair question. I wanted her to have a normal life. I- Joyce came to me, said Buffy couldn't make the hard choices... that she was too young... that it was up to me to do it."

"You still haven't answered the man, 'Gelus. Did you really believe when you walked out on her that she would be able to find happiness with a human?"

Angel's eyes dropped to his glass but it was a simple yes or no and refusing to answer would be every bit as telling as the truth. "No, I didn't think she would find someone else, not someone who'd stick. I thought I could give her some space, a chance to grow, a chance to try a relationship with a guy her own age and then when we were both adults... I thought we were soulmates. I came back from hell for her... I thought we had all the time in the world... If I stayed away long enough for her to grow up a bit, there was always the hope that some day I'd find a way around the curse, but I had to let her think it was over for good, otherwise everyone would say that she never had her real chance at a normal life. Okay?"

Giles' face was cold as ice, but Spike's was a mask of fury and the glass of bourbon that he had happened to be drinking from shattered in his fist, leaving a trail of mixed blood and alcohol to drip unheeded from his hand as he tried to control the urge to free his demon.

"How the hell can you even ask that? You set out to deliberately break her heart thinkin' you could just trot back when you felt like it and pick up the pieces. An' you're the one that's meant to have the soul?"

"Well," Giles said calmly as he fetched a clean dishtowel from the kitchen to stem the blood flow from Spike's hand. "I think, whatever doubts I may have regarding the longevity of your relationship with Buffy, I am at least grateful that she has been spared that fate."

Spike allowed Giles to pull several slivers of glass from his hand before wrapping it in the tea towel, while Angel continued to make excuses.

"You're twisting things. I mean, maybe deep down I didn't think she would find someone else, but if I'd stayed around... with the curse and everything, or if I'd told her I was leaving to look for a cure and kept her waiting, hoping that I'd come back, that would have been more cruel. This way, she made a fresh start."

"Yeah, she made such a great 'fresh start' that she let the first floppy-haired, blue-eyed, insincere sweet-talker as was as far from bein' you as she could find con her into seducing him, just to convince herself that her sex-life didn't begin and end with a one-night stand with a fucking bastard who told her she was crap in bed. An' that worked out so well that when that git didn't even call her back, makin' her two for two on wakin' up alone, she went from there to Ol' Yeller. Guy can't think you're inadequate in bed if he's got all the imagination of a turnip. Yeah, you gave her a chance at a fresh start alright!"

Giles did his best to ignore what the blond unwittingly gave away in his temper, letting his voice cut a soothing path through the vampire's anger. "If you were human I would say that you need stitches," the watcher told him.

Spike pulled back the edges of the towel to have a look, finally breaking the malevolent glare that he had been sending Angel's way. When he saw the extent of the damage, he gave a grunt. "As Buffy would say, 'I'll live'."

"I suspect her level of concern on these matters may have altered slightly since the last time your hands were similarly impaired," Giles pointed out, knowing the vampire was thinking of the time when he had grabbed a sword blade with both hands so that its wielder couldn't use it to attack Buffy.

"Doesn't make her medical assessment any further from bein' true. It'll heal up just fine, an' at least there's just the one hand knackered this time." He glared over to the sofa where Angel was sitting. "I believe it's your turn to ask a question, 'Sire." His formality twisted like a dull-edged blade compared to his normal playful disrespect.

In lieu of answering what was, after all, a far more complicated question than Angel might realise, and one that, simply by making him think of his feelings for Buffy, would soften the edge on his anger, the blond went in search of more bourbon. This time he didn't bother with a glass. He just pulled the cork with his teeth, spat it across the room and dropped sideways into the armchair, tipping the bottle back until he had drunk far more than two fingers. "None of your bloody business. Fire away, watcher!"

Giles shrugged. "Alright, when you first got engaged, Buffy mentioned having extorted some promise from you in addition to you agreeing to be married in church. I'd almost forgotten about it. Now seems like as good a time as any to ask what it was..."

Spike gave a snort of laughter. "Don't know as I dare tell you that one when the slayer's not here to see your face. She'd stake me good an' proper for spoilin' her fun." Giles, however, raised an eyebrow and Spike conceded.

"We had a barney, 'cause I said next time she takes a high-dive I'd be watchin' the next sunrise rather than go through what... well, let's just say I thought I was doin' pretty well to make it once through last summer. Buffy had other ideas, wasn't happy 'bout me leavin' Bit so that she'd lose both of us in one day, said she wouldn't marry a quitter. She said I had to promise to keep fightin' the good fight until I had good reason to think I might end up in heaven with her or until I'd spent at least as long with the white hats as I did on the other side."

"But... for... I mean, Buffy could die any time. If... You signed away a hundred and twenty years for the sake of... it could be months. I can't think of a slayer who's even made it to thirty. That's insane."

Giles shook his head as he turned to the elder vamp. "No," he almost whispered. "That is love."

"An' 'sides, it's not entirely outside the realms of possibility that I might somehow get to where I think I've got a chance of joinin' her... forever. That's gotta be worth tryin' for."

"I have her. And when she's gone I'll have a promise to keep that I made to her and the hope that some day I can be with her again."

"It doesn't work like that. You... The things you've done are unforgiveable. You can't just... This is damnation we're talking about. You don't get time off for good behaviour."

"Boo hoo! You're not talkin' about me. You're talkin' about you and your tortured bloody martyr act.

I can do any damn thing I want with that woman in my corner. For her, I'll do whatever it takes... whether that's playin' bodyguard for every damn slayer between now an' the end of the world or cheatin' good old Saint Peter at poker. One way or another, I will claw my way back to her and that is what you'll never understand because you ran a mile the minute Joyce even looked at you funny."

"So, what? You think you're in with a chance again? Forget it. Buffy loves me just as I am so I'm not real big on the idea of change just for the sake of it, but I will do whatever it takes. If it turns out that I need a damn soul, I'll go to Africa and take the demon trials and get the damn thing back... an' it'll be mine, free an' clear and paid for, not one as decides to up an' go for a wander any time Buffy smiles at me, neither. An', yeah, just in case you were wondering, that was a dig at you needin' to get your leg over to get happy, you selfish git, rather than just needin' to be with her an' make her happy. 'Course, I have to wonder, if you ever really loved any woman more than the whole broodfest, how come once you found out about the curse why the trials didn't occur to you."

"Nope, don't figure I need you to tell me the answer to that one. An' I reckon the librarian's 'bout due to think up a question for you again, seein' as how it's meant to be you two as are settlin' your issues. So, I'll go with fancy a refill, Rupes?"

Giles tilted his empty crystal glass as if he hadn't quite been able to tell from its original angle whether there was anything left in it or not.

"I think that's a yes on the good stuff but an okay on the forfeit stuff," the watcher answered, raising the half-full glass in his other hand.

Spike smirked, having neatly passed over the role of inquisitor without drawing any proverbial blood from the former watcher. He picked up the second bottle of "good" stuff from the counter and tipped an inch into the bottom of both his and Giles' empty tumblers, giving Angel an impatient glare that communicated his refusal to mix Glenmorangie with the other less peaty single malt that the brunette had yet to finish. Then, he topped up Giles' other glass from the bottle from which he'd been drinking.

"No, you didn't. I asked if you wanted a refill. You said yes to the sixteen men of Tain and okay to the other. Jus' drink up an' think of a question, Rupert."

Giles turned hard, tired eyes on Angel. "Why do you think Buffy would expect me to find your presence to be a dampener on the festivities?"

Angel picked up the glass of bourbon and knocked back significantly more than two fingers before he answered. "We-ell, there was that whole torture thing. I mean I apologized, I'm sure I apologized, and it's not like I had my soul at the time... but..."

Spike gave a snort of disgust. "The torture thing? You honestly think that was the big deal. Hell, I got some psychopath to stick red hot pokers through you and you don't hold it against me. It's just this whole big karmic cycle. I tortured you, you tortured Giles..."

"Tell Wes it's no big deal. That's the whole thing between him and Faith. Don't see those two making peace."

"What did he have?" Angel repeated blankly, as if Spike's question were nonsensical.

"Ye-ah. What. Did. He. Have?" Spike all but spelled it out a letter at a time. "He must have had something she wanted... Money, information, nifty little ring, what?"

"His dignity. His pride. She just wanted to use him to get to me. She told him she wanted to hear him scream."

"Ouch. That had to hurt," the blond winced as he took a sip of his good whisky. "Anyway, torture schmorture, if that's the big deal then, let's think... I tortured you, you tortured Giles, say Giles tortures slayer the second, she tortured Wes and Wes tortures..." Spike paused as even semi-inebriated he realised that for the circle idea to work it had to come back to the beginning.

"Okay, how's about you let the librarian torture you right back for a day or two and by your reckoning that'd make you all square? I can give him some hints. I kinda took notes... well, not physical notes, but I did pay attention as to what made you yell loudest when old Mozart went to work... well, up until I got bored."

Giles gave the straight-haired vampire a cold smile. "I'll tell you why not. Tempting as that prospect is, I believe that Angel knows that to be a very small part of the problem."

"Oooh! Less than total honesty. What a shock." Spike's voice was laced with sarcasm. "Ya know, I think half the time you censor your own thoughts so much it's just like a lobotomy... or maybe I'm overthinking things again. Maybe it was a lobotomy. Better drink up what's left in that glass, Brood Boy. And that makes it my turn to ask you something..."

"Congratulations!" Marie wrapped her arms around Wes in greeting before stepping back and handing him a manilla folder. "The first case for your new business, of course you really should go see about getting your house set up as your official place of business so that we have somewhere to send the cheque come the month end but, hey... See what you can make of it." She linked an arm through his, pulling him toward the door into the restaurant. "And lunch is on me to celebrate."

Wes couldn't help but smile at the latina's enthusiasm. "I'm sure the case will be fine," he reassured her as they were led to a table for two by the restaurant's front window.

"Now, you get that we need two versions of any reports that might end up touching on the demon population? The full ones won't go on official record and that's partly why these informal meetings are good. It's not like you can tell a jury that the defendant is innocent because the real culprit is a Shirago demon. We just point out that the crime would require a strength in excess of all but the most dedicated of bodybuilders and let them draw their own conclusions."

"I'm sorry. I guess I'm kinda nervous... I'm not sure about this whole just friends thing... not that, I mean. This is coming out all wrong. It's difficult working out what's appropriate. I mean I already hugged you and maybe I- I mean it could look like I expect something from you in return for the work... You do know that you'll continue to get work on what I'm sure will be your undoubted merits regardless of whether you let me take liberties with your personal space or not, don't you? I mean if you're not comfortable with..."

Wes gave her a reassuring smile. "You're fine. You haven't done anything that falls outside the bounds of propriety, and what's appropriate is simply what feels right... It would take a true misogynist to object to a beautiful woman like yourself walking arm in arm with him." His smile eased into a playful grin. "I may revise my opinon, when and if you take to sticking dollar bills in my waistband, however."

"Good. You know I think I might just have to get Lori to type up something to that effect for you to sign just to be sure you don't slap me with a sexual harrassment suit somewhere down the line."

"I think that's highly unlikely." The detective ducked his head slightly giving Marie the full benefit of his dark curling lashes as their fingertips came to together over the table in a tentative brush. "I suspect that if we didn't both feel the need to take things slowly for Rosa's sake that I would already have given in to the urge to see if your lips taste as sweet as they look." Marie flushed though she couldn't help but stare into those clear blue eyes until Wes gave a self-deprecating grin.

"I'm not saying that it would have been a good idea. I'm sure you know that there was someone in LA and I know you deserve a man who wants you for yourself, not to help him forget a girl who never even noticed his existence except to tell him that he wasn't welcome. Rosa's right. We're not ready, yet, neither one of us, but that doesn't mean that it hasn't crossed my mind."

Marie raised her eyes to the ceiling briefly before giving the sort of mischievous grin Wes associated more with her daughter. "The thought crossed my mind, too... On its way to set up home in other areas." She gave a theatrical sigh. "But friends is good, for now."

"Heyyy!" Spike broke the contemplative silence that had settled over the group. "Glory tortured me. I tortured Angel. Angel tortured you and you killed Glory, which is kinda one up one torturing, so we're all sorted already."

"I believe we already covered that before your... whatever he is decided to take a little nap." Giles slurred slightly from his seat on the floor with his back to one of the armchairs.

Spike grunted as he leaned over from his sideways position in the armchair to refill Giles' glass of Glenmorangie. "Some vamp. Outdrunk by a human."

"We did ask him rather more questions than we did each other and he did seem to, as you pointed out, edit the facts on enough occasions that I suspect he's drunk a bit more than either of us."

"Still..." Spike took a slow sip of the single malt before giving a dispirited sigh. "We can't fix this, can we?"

"Yeah, but I didn't understand back then. I mean, Bitty told me... she said that the gypsy was the one, that he took away your one chance at real happiness but I didn't know the real problem."

"Said you practically glowed just thinkin' 'bout her, that she could make you all flustered. She said that you were settlin' when it came to your Scouser. What she neglected to mention was that the pair of you had been on the outs and on the point of patchin' it up... an', yeah, people die. It's part of the natural order even if us fangy types sometimes hurry things along. An' I knew when you told broody boy... When you said, 'That's Love,' it was her you were thinking about not Floella Benjamin," Spike continued, citing the vague similarity between Olivia and a British children's TV presenter of the 1970's. "If it was just that he killed her that'd be one thing... but he took away your one chance to make your peace. He didn't just take her away from you... He took away your chance to make things right with her... An' that's a whole different thing.

Short of bringin' her back from the dead, there's just no way to make that right..."

"Do I look like our resident megalomaniac redhead?" Spike gave the store-owner a lopsided glare which, since Giles was sitting on the floor with his back to the armchair that Spike was sprawled sideways across, sailed straight over the top of his oblivious head. "An' there ain't no way I'm openin' up a seance neither. Never know who or what's gonna accept an invite into your life specially not on the Hellmouth, even if I wasn't like to find out that her great-granny or summat with the same name would just as soon haunt me as him."

Spike shrugged, not seeing any point being less than honest. "Dear ol' Darla thought we could terrorise them into takin' Rip van Winkle's soul back. Couple of nights after it happened the three of us pretty much took out the whole encampment, men, women an' children. Not exactly what I would call a bright idea. I mean, I could've told her anyone as can think up a curse like that one wasn't gonna back down, but once we started if we'd left enough of them alive to raise the power there'd have been four of us wanderin' round with souls rather 'an one, so..."

"It lives... well nearly," Spike drawled sarcastically. "Now it just needs to learn to speak again."

"I said so bring her soul back." Angel rolled over to face the other two men in the room.

"You just pretend to pass out to geroff the hook?" Spike asked as Giles waded in with his own question.

"Spike's so confident he's Mr Happy, he won't object to a visitor for a while. There's an emergency kit in the trunk of the convertible... spell book, herbs, Orb of Thessula, everything you need. It can't be that difficult to alter the curse so that a specific soul is called. And if he's telling the truth about being happy just to make Buffy happy-."

"No-o-o-o buggerin' way!" Spike objected. "No way I'm doin' that again. Was bad enough with Buffy in my head. No way I'm lettin' some bint I've never met in there."

"You mean we could specific'ly curse Spike with Jenny's soul?" Giles asked obviously intrigued by the prospect in a way he would never allow himself to become if he were sober.

"Aren't either of you two listening? I'm not for sharin'. There's a little bit of William an' a whole lot of demon in here already an' that's plenty for any corpse. I'm not in favour of anythin' as might lead to me peein' sittin' down, or peein' at all come to that, an' I'm pretty certain Buffy ain't gonna want some other bint in here neither."

"Buffy wants this settled. You're the one that said that meant bringing Jenny back. D'you want to tell her that the first time she leaves you in charge of anything that you failed because you were too scared to do what needed to be done?"

"I am not gonna have some woman set up shop in my body just 'cause you try to say I'm chicken. You think it's such a swell idea you let her share with you."

"Even if you could get her to share and even if somehow I ended up bein' happy enough to free her soul after, and we only know one sure way for that to work, that'd mean letting Angelus loose... and if you're as happy as you like to make out, it's hardly going to be a problem."

"Ya know, there's times I think you're even more of a bastard with that damn soul than without it."

Giles smirked as he took another unneeded sip of whisky. "You did say you would do anything to give Buffy her perfect day," he pointed out with an uncharacteristic giggle.

"Glad someone finds this so amusin'," Spike finally conceded with ill grace, "but don't think she's stayin' long, so you better make the most of it."

"So I'm on my back on the floor in a puddle of demon entrails and Cordy walks in and she doesn't even notice the body behind the door and she looks at me lying there and she says, 'Is this really the sort of first impression you want to give the clients?' and then just to top that, she adds, '...And you really might want to rethink that aftershave. It smells like something died-."

"Wes?" Marie asked, puzzled by his sudden silence until she realised that his attention was riveted on a group by the door, who for the most part seemed yet to have noticed him. The look on his face was self-explanatory and Marie took matters into her own hands, scooting her chair around the small circular table as she whispered in his ear. "Don't take this the wrong way... I'm all in favour of the waiting but the forgetting thing, seems like round about now you could use some help... on a strictly friends basis."

She raised a gentle hand to his cheek, turning his head toward her. Her lips pressed to his for just a fraction of a second before he responded to their touch, his eyes drifting closed rather than trying to keep track of the quartet from LA. Leaning in toward her, he cradled her head as the embrace deepened into a tender exploration.

"You screw this up and I won't need to be settin' her on anyone," Spike told him with more than a hint of smugness. "She'll come after ya all on 'er own. Doesn't stop me thinkin' we should be waitin' till you're all sobered up."

Angel sighed. "I'm not staying in Sunnydale another night, Spike. In case you've forgotten, Cordy is still missing."

"I haven't forgotten an' what I said about helpin' out if you need us still stands. Just seems to me like you might be forgettin' that there's an actual missin' boyfriend as well, as opposed to you who still falls into the wannabe category. Now there's a thought. Tell Builder's Bum that you're movin' in on 'is ex, an' me an' Buffy might actually get some peace for a day or two."

"What do I look like? The Ladybird book of what the hell's happened here since you left? Haven't you actually spoken to anyone from this town in the last three years? How many ex's has the bint got? An' how many do you think got a job on a building site and have been working on developing an appropriate cleavage for the last couple of years?"

"Xander? But Buffy said he got married, and I'm pretty sure she said his wife was a vengeance demon. He'd have-"

"To be insane? Doesn't stop him sticking his nose in our business an' Buffy never even went out with him... I'm sure he could do even better defending his former. Seems to me he likes you even less than he likes me. Assumin' Anya didn't just decide she'd had enough and just..." Spike made a slashing gesture in the region of his groin.

Spike looked down again at the printed sheet to which Giles had been making alterations. "Is there one bloody line of that thing that you haven't dismantled an' reassembled?

'Quad perditum est, invenietur?' What is lost, return? An' I don't think. What d'ya do just miss that bit out altogether? 'Not dead... nor not of the living'? I thought you said this had been translated into English? Shouldn't that be 'Neither dead nor of the living'? 'Cause I don't feature you sticking double negatives in some spell I barely understand an' it's all fine an' good if it's meant to apply to the body as the soul's meant to be goin' into, but it hardly applies to your gyppo girl. 'Spirits of the interregnum'? That's not gonna work.. 'Te implore, Deo omni'! This isn't a soddin' spell. It's a bloody prayer! You really think that God is gonna think, 'Yeah there's three pissed old buggers down there as want to have some fun with someone's soul. Sure, I'll play!'? 'Gods, bind him.' It was one god before. Do you even know who the heck you're prayin' to? 'Cast his heart from the evil realm'? 'Let this orb be the vessel that will carry his soul to him'... At least I reckon that bit's not so hard to change but the rest of it's just gonna come out like so much rubbish."

Giles gave Spike an owlish glare over the top of his glasses. "Are you casting asper- asper- doubts on my capabilities? I'll have you know I've been studying magic since you were in nappies."

Giles' scowl deepened. "It's hardly my fault when you wander around forever looking about thirty..."

"Nevertheless, I'm sure with Jenny's notes I can manage to adapt the spell to our purposes."

"Yeah, I bet you're sure. You're sure so long as it's me you're playin' with. Be a different matter if it was you that's gonna end up possessed by whatever you manage to call up."

"Spike!" Angel cut through the tirade. "And you call me a drama queen? Sit down. Shut up. Drink up, if you must, and let him work."

Spike sent the elder vampire a sour look and crossed his arms, like a petulant teenager for all of about a second before he uncrossed them again to take another drink. "Bloody mojo," the blond muttered under his breath.

"We could call Willow," the brunette suggested with mocking civility. "You never did say what the deal with Buffy throwing her out was..."

"Don't even think about it. I'd rather have Mr Benn the shopkeeper here, even if he is nine sheets, or however many that is to the wind. An' you're not askin' Glinda neither... That bloody spell was the first step on the road to hell for Red, an' I'm not riskin' the good witch."

Spike at last conceded he was in a no-win situation and decided that the quicker he could drink himself into oblivion the more smoothly the rest of this would go.

"Wesley?" Somehow, Fred managed to sound bewildered and betrayed, but when Marie made to draw away, it was Wes's hand that prevented her from breaking the kiss for just a second longer. He took Marie's hand as they parted, holding it in his as if the gesture came to them as second nature.

The watcher looked up at the Angel contingent far more coolly than he probably thought he had managed. "That is what my friends call me. I believe it would be more appropriate, however, for you to use Mr Wyndam-Pryce. Now, did you actually have something to say, or do you simply plan to wallow in self-pity because I'm no longer sufficiently enthralled to place myself at your beck and call?"

Gunn looked like he wanted to throw himself at the watcher when he saw the hurt expression on his girlfriend's face, but surprisingly, it was Faith's hand that held him back. "Past is past. This is his town. Let it lie." The slayer chivvied the rest of the group toward where the maitre d' waited to seat them.

"So," she asked as she lingered briefly before joining the others, "I guess I'd be pushing it to call you Wes?"

"I suspect you call everyone exactly what you feel like calling them but I doubt you call many people your friend," Wes answered with a half-smile. "I would introduce you, ladies, but Marie is due back in court in quarter of an hour and I think that's our bill arriving. Oh, and I don't know if Spike mentioned it when he and Giles came over, but the council will be arriving en masse in fairly short order. I don't know whether that will have any bearing on your plans but I thought you should know."

"No, they didn't get around to mentioning that..." Faith's voice faded away as she tried to figure out whether and how this piece of news might affect her. "Thanks for the warning... Wes."

Their waiter placed the bill on the table between them and Wes's hand covered Marie's before she could pick it up.

Wes shrugged. "Depending how things go on the case, I could always come over early enough to give you a hand with that... If that would be okay?"

"I think Rosa would like that... but I won't say anything in advance in case it turns out that you can't make it."

Marie's smile was wide, even if she was still slightly too unsure to quite meet Wes's eyes as she responded. "She'd like it, too... Just nothing too formal on a work night, okay?" She placed a selection of notes from her purse alongside the bill, and Wes helped her on with her jacket, his arm resting loosely around her waist, his other hand holding the manila file Marie had given him when they first came in, as they made their way to the exit. She was slightly surprised when Wes guided her to one side, the opposite direction from her car, immediately they left the restaurant.

He smiled at her puzzled glance, checking that they were out of sight of anyone still inside. "I just wanted you to be sure that I wasn't doing this for the benefit of any audience." His head ducked down to hers as she leant into the embrace, standing on tiptoe so that their lips could meet. His hand cradled her neck and then he let his thumb brush against the soft skin from the corner of her jaw to the tip of her chin as he whispered to her. "I think the time when I could be just a friend disappeared the second your lips touched mine. For good or bad, rebound or not, there's no going back. It's time for me to take Spike's advice, give in to the inevitable and enjoy the ride..." He gave her a look that was filled with all sorts of promise. "Figuratively speaking, of course. I wouldn't presume. Something as good as you has to be earned."

"And what makes you think, when you smile like the devil, that I want to be good?" Marie placed one last chaste kiss to his lips before walking backwards to her car, watching him all the way. "See you tonight," she promised before she finally closed the car door and headed back to the courthouse with little time to spare.

"Spirit of Jenny Calendar, Janna of the Calderash people,
I call on you in the realm of the dead
Let she who was rent from us be returned..." Spike took several more deep drinks from the bottle in his hand as Giles intoned his improvised ritual. He really wasn't sure what to expect. Perhaps they should count themselves lucky if the watcher's prayer was simply ignored.

"...I ask that you return to inhabit this vessel, which is neither dead nor of the living.
I implore you, Lord, to allow this. Listen to this plea.
Lord, let her heart be brought forth from its resting place and bound into this body.
Let this orb be the vessel that will carry her soul to him."

Spike breathed a sigh of relief as the watcher paused, the orb nothing more than a lump of polished crystal.

And then Giles began the chant over again, his voice firmer and more certain. Spike's heart sank as the orb began to glow. He had a bad feeling about this.

Giles' voice was increasingly imbued with certitude as if some inner sense was telling him that this was going to work.

"Spirit of Jenny Calendar, Janna of the Calderash people,
I call on you in the realm of the dead
Let she who was rent from us be returned.
I ask that you return to inhabit this vessel, which is neither dead nor of the living.
I implore you, Lord, to allow this. Listen to this plea.
Lord, let her heart be brought forth from its resting place and bound into this body.
Let this orb be the vessel that will carry her soul to him.

Even as the light in the orb flared and the sphere itself disintegrated, Spike dissolved into a fit of giggles wondering if Giles' impression of Jean-Luc Picard was deliberate or inadvertent. The laughter was cut short as Spike's head ripped back and light flared in his eyes.

It was Angel's turn to snicker. "Did I forget to mention that it hurts like a son of a bitch?"

It took a couple of seconds for the pain to recede to where Spike would have answered with a cutting remark, but the spirit in charge of his body had other ideas. She cared nothing for Angel's amusement. Her entire being hummed just to be near the man who was looking at her from the far side of the room. Giles' jaw dropped as Spike lowered his head to look him in the eyes and the watcher saw that his irises were no longer the vampire's normal cornflower blue but the deepest brown. The shape of his eyes remained unchanged, not large and round as Giles remembered them, but nevertheless they were unmistakeably Jenny's.

"The windows of the soul..." he whispered in amazement even as those full lips turned his given name into a question, the voice a bizarre combination of Jenny's intonation and Spike's richer tones.

Buffy and Dawn sat on one side of the large dining room table, with their backs to the picture window, while the minister sat on the other. Buffy was listening to what the preacher had to say, probably at least as intently as she had listened to any of her high school teachers. After all, she had the best incentive in the world not to want to flunk this class, but still she managed to devote part of her attention to scanning the spines of the books filling the glass fronted cases at the man's back, and the message that she was getting was 'Young Giles'... not in the sense of what Giles had really been like when he was young... but the young man they had believed that he had to have been before they knew any better.

It was comforting. Okay, so she was on unfamiliar ground with the whole bible study thing, but she knew where she was with 'book people'. Giles' texts were full of demons and magic. Reverend Hamilton's were rather different in content matter, at least the ones in English seemed to be, but when all was said and done - 'book people'. They were... dependable.

That was when the pain hit, travelling through her like a bolt of lightning and gone just as quickly. Buffy looked at the clock. They still had three quarters of an hour left of their two hour "tutorial". Last week's lesson had been destroyed by Xander bursting into the house, accusing Spike of trying to split up the Scoobies and eventually prompting an emotional outburst from Dawn. That had been after they had rescheduled from the previous Monday because Dru had kidnapped Spike. She hadn't even been able to confirm this week's lesson until earlier today because of everything that had happened over the last few days. She really needed to make it through this class and several more like it if she wanted to be confirmed in time for their planned wedding date but there was only one possible source for her little 'electric shock'.

"Buffy?" The minister's question coincided with a kick under the table from her little sister.

"Un-huh, sure..." she answered distractedly before changing her mind. It wasn't just the pain, which had gone almost as soon as it had come. She couldn't put her finger on it. It wasn't even so much a feeling of anything being wrong, more that something was different. "Maybe I just need to take a couple of Midol," she suggested, picking up her purse. "Is it okay if I use your bathroom?"

Wes sat behind the wheel of his car in the mall parking lot and had a brief flip through the folder that Marie had given him. There was nothing in the file itself to suggest that this was anything other than a routine investigation. All he had to do was find a missing witness, a hitchhiker who had been on her way to visit relatives in Seattle for spring break. If she existed and he found her, then the police would have to start looking for another suspect in their latest murder case. If she didn't, then the victim's husband was looking at motive, means and no alibi.

On the face of it, there was nothing to suggest demon involvement. Nothing except the sheer audaciousness of a young 'girl', unafraid to hitch-hike alone on a dark night and accept a ride from a male driver who gave his trade as longshoreman, a man whose photograph showed a physique most women would be intimidated by under those circumstances. A girl who hadn't come forward when the police had canvassed all the UC campuses, which meant perhaps, if she existed, he reminded himself, that she was a girl with something to hide.

She had given her name as Ellie. That, a composite picture that the grieving husband (read suspect) had compiled and some vague details he had managed to remember from their conversation were all Wes had. Even if the girl wasn't some figment of a desperate man's imagination, there was a good chance she might have been reluctant to give a stranger her real name.

So far, there were no arcane scripts in need of deciphering, nothing he couldn't easily cope with on his own. Logic told him that he should work the case as far as he could without help. Wes decided to let logic go hang. Pulling out the notebook he habitually carried, he turned to the last page with writing on, and used his cell phone to dial the number he had written there.

"Bee, it's Wes. You know that job you were fishing for? Marie just gave me a case, nothing so far requiring your special expertise, just general legwork, but they say two heads are better than one and there are always some people who'll respond more readily to a woman than a man..."

"Bottom line we both draw minimum wage, but with a share of any net profits on top, provided you're willing to pitch in with whatever needs doing as and when?" the watcher suggested.

"I think sixty - forty would be fair, bearing in mind I've got the PI licence and I'll be the one taking the risks if we don't break even... renegotiable if anyone else joins the team or if one of us ends up doing more than their fair share of the work."

"How about I come over and pick you up? I'm planning on driving down to County to speak to Marie's client first hand. I'll fill you in on the details on the way. If we have time after that, we can check out UC Sunnydale, maybe do some online research. If we need to go further afield it can wait until tomorrow."

Bee looked down at the paint smears on her hands and on the oversized men's shirt she wore to protect her other clothes and at the brushes that needed cleaning. "Give me twenty minutes to get tidied up. I was kinda in the middle of something."

Wes contemplated a nearby florist shop and smiled. "I think I can keep myself busy for that long."

"It's nothing that demands your immediate attention, Buffy, I assure you." Giles' response, in fact, did little if anything to reassure Buffy, especially as she was fairly sure that she could make out a muffled version of Spike in 'rant' mode in the background and the vampire had failed to answer the phone in his own apartment or even take the receiver from Giles when he heard her name.

"Why do you still sound sober, Giles? Spike was supposed to be the one staying sober, not you. You were supposed to be loose. And why's he shouting at Angel?" Buffy hissed into the phone to avoid her voice carrying outside the room.

"He's not shouting at Angel and I was drunk. I was very drunk... at your suggestion I hasten to point out. I just sobered up rather more quickly than normal and to be fair, I don't actually recall you telling Spike that he had to stay sober, just that he had to get us drunk."

"Well, if he's shouting at you, wouldn't he do a more efficient job from somewhere where you could hear better?"

"I can hear perfectly well. Too well, in fact. We-e-e... we have an additional guest. Spike is in the bathroom with them, and perhaps after you finish your lesson and drop Dawn back at home you might want to come over, but no one is in any immediate danger... unless Angel does some sort of damage to himself from laughing. I'm afraid he is still rather drunk."

Before Buffy could ask the identity of the unexpected guest, a series of sharp raps on the door was followed by Dawn's voice. "Buffy, is everything okay? Mr Hamilton sent me to check on you. He says if you're ill we can finish off on Thursday."

"Hang on, Dawn." Buffy unbolted the bathroom door and pulled her sister into the room.

"Promise me you're telling the truth, Giles." Dawn rolled her eyes as her sister continued to hiss down the phone.

"There's nothing that you can do now that you won't be able to do in an hour or even a couple of hours time."

"Okay-y-y," Buffy conceded grudgingly. "I better go. Duty calls, but I'll be there soon... ish."

"Giles swears it'll keep... and the platinum pest will never let me live it down if we have to push the ceremony back because I keep skipping out on my lessons. Let's go."

"So, what was it, drunken wrestling match? Spike and Angel get in another fight? ...'cause if they did and I missed it again..."

"No fight... I don't think. Giles wasn't exactly forthcoming. Besides I want to ask Mr Hamilton if he thinks that whole demon possession thing is meant to be taken literally, or if it's some sort of metaphor..."

"You know if you keep asking questions and side-tracking him it's going to take longer, don't you?"

"Colour me curious," Buffy answered with a shrug. "And at least he doesn't rag on me for asking questions. I still think Rasputin was some sort of demon, maybe kinda like that Doc guy, but would my lecturers at college-." She glanced over and caught the expression on her sister's face. "Never mind. You had to be there. Let's just say that having someone other than Willow to argue 'demons and monsters throughout history' with is kinda cool."

"I'm glad you think so," the minister responded, coming through from the back of the house toward the dining room door near the bottom of the stairs with three mugs in his hands. "I thought you might be able to use a coffee, assuming you feel up to staying," he explained as he re-entered the room where they had been studying, distributing the mugs and reaching into his pocket to pull out a bag of chocolate cookies, which he tossed onto the centre of the table before they took their seats once more.

Across town in another bathroom a far different drama was playing out. "No way. I am not leaving this room until you get your damned brain away from shaggin' the bloody watcher."

"It's your hormones. Your body. I've haven't had a thought like this in four years."

"Yeah, my hormones, my body, and it's my bloody willy as well, so I'd be obliged if you stop playing with it."

"Nobody said you were touching it, but would you stop getting so damned worked up thinkin' about the bloody librarian? Bloody thing doesn't know what to do. You're imagining the old codger in the buff, tellin' it to sit up an' beg an' I'm tellin' it that I want to puke my guts up at the thought."

"Yeah, right, an' I'm standin' in a bloody bathroom with my dick goin' up an' down like a yo-yo over a bloke as has been mistaken for my father before now, yellin' at myself like the 'Seven faces of Sybil', for no reason at all."

"So? Rupert gets me hot. So sue me. I love him. I thought you would understand that."

"Look, I don't care if you flooded your knickers every time you were within ten feet of him. I think it's bloody marvellous that the old bugger had it in him, to be quite honest, but I'm not goin' back out into that room until you calm down. An' besides, in case you hadn't noticed that picture you're carryin' round in your head is a bit out of date. The last four years have not been kind to your honey bun."

Spike scowled but finally lowered his voice to a more conversational level. "Point taken. Still not goin' back out there until this thing's behavin' an' you're not helpin' any, relivin' past glories. You want to talk to him, you're gonna have to pull yourself together."

"What's the diff? With your shirt like that no one can tell." One of Spike's hands gestured to how his shirt hung untucked over the top of his jeans.

"I can tell an' I'm not goin' to spend all night squirmin' in my chair like a bloody schoolboy. Am I clear?"

"An' believe me, whether Angel-arse out there can see anything or not, he can tell, so at least try to keep your mind on other things."

"I'll try, but being in your body seems to be equivalent to living off a diet of oysters. I don't know how you ever think about anything else."

"With difficulty," Spike conceded. "Especially when Buffy's around. An' last night's menu still isn't helpin' any. "

"Pet, I can't drink enough to make it non-operational. All the booze can do is make me less than discriminatin'... An' that's the closest thing to an explanation for Harmony that anyone's gonna get."

Angel's voice carried through from the living room. "Harmony? Cordy's Harmony?" The question was followed by a thump as the vamp slid off the couch onto the floor because he was laughing so hard.

This finally got Spike mad enough to storm out of the bathroom, eyes flashing, no longer caring what state of arousal he was in. "Laugh all you want, Brood boy. I might have screwed the bimbo but at least I'm just some sort of cousin and not her great-grandsire. I'm not directly responsible for the fact that Barbie's pretty little head is gonna be stayin' empty forever."

"What the hell are you blathering about, Spike?" the older vamp asked with more than a hint of Ireland in his voice.

"Smell her? You couldn't smell anything past the truckload of perfume she was wearing."

"Couldn't or didn't want to? Same as you didn't want to remember all the gophers you just had to make when your soul had its little holiday, one of whom made a little friend all of her own an' he just happened to drop in on Buffy and Harm's graduation. Congratulations, gramps, it's a girl. I hope she'll grow up to make you proud."

The colour drained from Angel's face, which Spike figured was a pretty neat trick for a vampire.

"Pull the other one..." Angel began, but he didn't finish the saying. The huge smirk on Spike's face was enough to convince him that his grandchilde was telling the truth. "Aw shite!" he swore, drawing out the second word so that it almost seemed to have two syllables. He half sat on the floor, half fell on his butt, holding his glass high to avoid spilling any of the bourbon inside and then poured its contents down his throat in one.