(Barbara Dickson, Lyrics and Music by T Rice and A Lloyd Webber
[I know. I know. I'm eternally sorry but the lyrics kind of fit.])

Chapter 2.01

Xander hovered anxiously outside the bathroom door for several seconds before he turned on his heel, picked up his apartment keys and headed out. He got as far as turning the handle of the front door before he broke and turned back.

"Ahn, honey, don’t cry. Please don’t cry."

"Why?" Anya’s wail couldn’t quite be muffled by the door. "Isn’t that allowed when a woman’s husband leaves her?"

"Ahn! I’m not leaving you." Xander gave an exasperated sigh. "Why would you think I’m leaving you?"

"Oh, that’s right. I suppose you’ll be kicking me out instead."

"Anya, what are you talking about?" By now Xander stood with his ear to the door trying to catch what his wife was saying between sniffs.

"She’s not gay, you know. She says she is, but you don’t just grow up being all attracted to men and then suddenly, whoosh attracted to women instead. She might prefer sex with women, and be more inclined towards finding a female partner but if she were totally gay instead of bisexual, she would never have been attracted to you and Oz in the first place. I hope you’ll both be very happy."

"Alright, Anya, this is getting surreal. Would you please come out of the bathroom so we can talk about this."

"No."

Xander looked heavenward and muttered a plea for patience. "Why not? We obviously need to talk and I’d much rather be able to see your face while I do it."

"No, you wouldn’t."

"Yes, I would. I love your face."

"Not when it’s all red and puffy."

"Even when it’s all red and puffy. Please, hon, come out. Come talk to me."

"So that you can tell me how much you like Willow again?"

"No, so you can tell me why you think I would ever leave you."

"You hate me." Anya gulped through what were obviously more tears.

"Ahn, I don’t hate you. Why would you think I hate you?"

"You hate demons. You said you would be nice to my friends, so I brought Evie home, but you were just like normal. You can’t help it. You just hate us all, and now that Tara won’t be staying with Willow, I guess you two will be free to do all the footsie stuff you haven’t done yet."

"Anya, Willow might be free. She might or might not be gay. I’m kind of inclined to think she might actually know her own mind on that one. I’m not and I don’t want to be."

"Well, if you were gay you wouldn’t be leaving me for Willow, you’d be leaving me for one of the guys on your construction crew or Spike. You were attracted to Spike."

"I was never attracted to Spike. I meant I’m not free. I’m not free. I’m married to you, and if I’m very lucky I will be until I die."

Another loud gulp came from beyond the door. "Then why did you lie about being nice to my friends?"

"I didn’t lie. I-."

"You said you would be nice to my friends."

"Yes, but-."

"And you weren’t. So you lied. I think you were worried about being left all alone, but now you don’t need me because you’ll have Willow, till she ages herself to death at least."

"Now, see, that’s why I wasn’t nice to Evie. I don’t generally sit and have a beer with people who want to kill my friends."

"Pfft! If Evie had wanted to kill Willow you’d be ordering flowers for the funeral already. She’s never been one for the kill. More the embarrassing situations and stuff. That’s why she was so tee-ed off at Willow and her more powerful than thou attitude."

"Look, Ahn. Why don’t you unlock the door, come on out and explain exactly what happened from the beginning. Please. Maybe once I know what’s going on I’ll be giving you a nice big apology."

"And maybe, we’ll just argue about it all over again."

Xander played his trump card. "Or maybe I’ll admit I was totally wrong and we’ll have make up sex. The kind where I prove again and again exactly how sorry I am."

"And you’ll write a full letter of apology to Evie and invite her over for dinner or something?"

"If I’m convinced that I made a mistake."

"Really?"

"Really."

"And you’re not just saying that?"

"I’m not just saying that."

"And next time you have to choose between Willow and me or Buffy and me, you’ll choose me as if you were really my husband?"

"Ahn. That’s not-." The stony silence from the other side of the door made him shut him up before he could protest about the unfairness of having to give such a guarantee. "I am really your husband." Xander changed track, sounding puzzled as the second half of what Anya had said sunk in.

"Then, you’ll back me up like a husband should? Like I deserve? Instead of treating me like my opinion’s worthless. We get to have a proper marriage? Because right now you act like you’re the chief executive and Willow and Buffy are the junior partners and I’m just the stock boy. You never listen to me."

"I want to listen to you now."

"And what happens if when I tell you what happened, you understand my viewpoint, but you don’t actually agree with it?"

"Then I apologise for being a total boor instead of being an idiot. You still get the make up sex and your friend gets a slightly less grovelly letter of apology for me being rude, even if I wasn’t wrong."

There was a click as Anya unbolted the door. Xander noticed as she drew the door open just a crack that she was right. Her face was all red and puffy. He didn’t care a bit.

"Come here," he asked her softly, holding his arms wide. "You are my number one girl. You are the one I come home to. You are the one I hold in my arms before I go to sleep. You’re the one I dream about. It’s your face that I see when I wake up in the morning. It’s your voice that makes me smile when you call me at work.

Willow and Buffy are important to me. I guess I’m kind of hoping, recent mistakes not withstanding that we’ll always be friends, but you are my wife. Maybe I got cold feet first time around, but that was because of how seriously I take those vows that we made. If I was the kind of guy who could go into marriage thinking that if it didn’t work out we could get a divorce somewhere down the line, then there would have been no reason for me to back out. I’m not. I made those vows for life, and I will do whatever it takes to make this marriage work. I love you. I may not show it very well, but if you can be patient with me when I do something stupid, I’ll never stop trying to make things right."

He kissed her on the forehead; a chaste and reassuring caress. Anya tilted her head back and returned the kiss with an equally tender one on his lips before she led him through to the bedroom where they curled together fully clothed as she began her tale.

"I guess it kind of goes back to the meeting after the engagement party. You know, if you’d gone…"

Xander kissed the back of her neck. "I’ll go to the next one, wherever it is, okay?"

"Well, we all discussed what to do about Riley and the Initiative listening in. It turns out that after we all talked it over and decided to wait, Willow decided she knew best, and that’s sort of your fault because you always let her tell you what you should do, so she sent an email to Sam, instead…"

* * * * *

"So, is it your turn to tell me what a bad witch I am?" Willow glared at her friend, who surprisingly found a wet, trembling nose pressing into her hand. It seemed that the dog might be scared witless by Willow, but she still wasn’t prepared to leave any of her new "family" alone with the witch.

"No. That’s not why I’m here." Buffy leant against the doorframe at one side while her other hand scratched the puppy behind the ears, trying to reassure the beast, who stood with her tail tucked right down between her legs.

"Then, why are you here. To tell me I lost out on a personality contest between me and a dog?"

"Will, you know that’s not what happened."

"Isn’t it? You’re moving me out so that you can move the dog in."

"We couldn’t just leave it to get picked up and taken back to the pound."

Willow affected a nonchalant shrug. "It’s where it came from."

"I’d never have guessed," Buffy replied, Willow’s hostility pushing her into sarcastic mode. "Look, I have to think about Dawn’s welfare first and foremost. You have a tremendous gift, but right now you don’t seem to be using it responsibly. I know whether you live here or not, it doesn’t actually make a difference. If you wanted to, you could wipe us all out with hardly any effort at all, but appearances are everything as far as Dawn feeling secure is concerned. She was only just starting to come round after the whole crash thing. This, on top of what happened, is just too much to expect her to put up with. She needs to feel this is a place where she can heal, where she isn’t threatened in any way."

"And you’re saying I’m threatening?"

"Not directly. I don’t think you would deliberately set out to harm any of us, but people around you get hurt when these things go wrong. I can’t tell Dawn that she has to share a house with you under the circumstances, or I should say that I won’t."

"So, it’s all for Dawnie’s sake, is it?"

Buffy looked at her shoes. "No- No, it isn’t. There are times I don’t recognise you. Times, like when I saw this dog, that I don’t think I know what you’re capable of.

Spike said you would have had to kill a deer to get me back. I’m not sure the Willow I remember could have done that."

"Probably not. I guess we had to make some hard choices while you were dead."

"No harder than I had to make when I came back, or is it just coincidence that you got me back on the scene just as the money ran out?"

"Is that what you think? That I got you back to make life easier for me?"

"Well, you were certainly too busy wallowing in your own problems to even notice mine. You could at least have got me out the damn coffin. Do you have any idea what that is like? Forget it. There’s no way to know unless you have to do it."

"I’m sorry. We didn’t think…"

"Yes, and all your magic is like that lately, but it’s not just the magic that’s the problem. We discussed what we should do about the Initiative. We came to a decision as a group, to wait things out a bit. You don’t have the right to decide you know better than everyone else. You seem to think you’re equipped to run everyone’s life for them, but I’m responsible for Dawn and her safety. If you wanted the job, you should have left me in the ground, but then you might have ended up having to work in a burger bar and quit college."

"It wasn’t like that," Willow protested. "We just didn’t realise."

Buffy gave a sigh. "This isn’t what I wanted to say."

"No, but it explains why you haven’t been talking to me all this year. Maybe you should have said it all sooner. Got it out in the open? So that you didn’t have to pretend to be my friend any more."

"That’s not it. I wanted to tell you that I agree that we had no option but to ask you to move out, but I do still want to be your friend. I don’t know how exactly we can make that work yet, but when you cool down and you have time to think, I want you to call me.

Yes, I guess I have issues about last summer and it probably would have been better to have a rant and clear the air, but I knew you’d take it personally and I figure a lot of it is post-grave paranoia. But we’ve been friends for six years now. I don’t plan on giving up on you if you’ll stick with me."

This time Buffy didn’t wait for a reply, she simply backed out of the door, her canine "protector" coming with her all too gladly.

* * * * *

Xander froze in position when the phone rang. Anya moaned in protest. "Don’t stop. God! Don’t stop."

The carpenter threw back the sheet, which had been covering him, and crawled up his wife’s body, stopping to plant kisses on his wife’s abdomen and chest then finally neck and face as he explained. "It’s late, hon. No one would be ringing after eleven if it wasn’t something important. I’ve got to answer."

He picked up the receiver by the bed just after the answering machine message had kicked in, cutting it off in mid-sentence.

"Hi. We’re here." He paused to pull a stray hair from his mouth as he listened to the person on the other end of the line.

"No. I’m really sorry, but I can’t. We’re kind of busy… Well, yes. We were, if you must know… No, it is not. There is far more to Anya and me than our hormones, and that’s exactly why I can’t come and you can’t stay here… No, Willow. It just happens that the one thing that is more important to me than our friendship is my marriage and since me and Anya have already had one major row about this whole thing tonight, there is no way I’m doing anything that’s going to lead to another… Yes, well, we were until you rang… Why don’t you go to your parents?… They did, huh?… What about your bed and all the other stuff from your room?... The basement?" Despite himself Xander couldn’t prevent a small smile as he remembered Willow’s comment, at around the time she’d split up with Oz. ‘You live in a basement? That’s dire.’ It sounded like that particular chicken was coming home to roost.

"Look, Will. I get that you don’t want to turn up on their doorstep at this time of night. Why don’t you go to a motel? The one I went to after the BLF, as you called it, is kind of a dive, but it’s cheap, and if you don’t have the cash I could ring up and book you a room using my credit card… Well, I guess I could probably run to wherever Giles is staying, for one night, if you let me know which one it is, but how come if Spike already offered you a lift, you were wanting me to come out?… You think this whole thing is because Spike’s turning Dawn and Buffy against you?" Xander gave Anya an enquiring look, to which his wife emphatically shook her head.

"Look, I admit I don’t know the full story. What say I come over between when I finish work and when Anya shuts The Magic Box tomorrow? Then, we can talk… Yes, Willow that is when I can fit you into my busy schedule, but if you would prefer me not to come, at all, then just say so… Fine, if that’s how you want it, but don’t forget I offered." Xander returned the phone to its cradle.

"Where were we?" he asked his wife, kissing her first on the lips and then down the side of her neck.

"You were just about to give me an orgasm, but I think saying no to Willow was even better. You really chose me."

"I really did, and unless you’re way in the wrong I’m going to try to make a habit of it. Okay?"

"Well, obviously, I wouldn’t expect you to compromise your integrity."

"I have integrity?" Xander asked in a teasingly incredulous voice. "Then, I guess I better live up to that promise I made earlier.

"Which promise was that?" Anya asked.

"The one about making you scream so loud we’ll get complaints from everyone else in the building."

* * * * *

Willow packed an overnight bag, throwing in her laptop, the phone that Buffy had given her, an oversized T-shirt that she used as a nightshirt and some clothes for the next morning.

She couldn’t believe that they had all betrayed her. Even Xander. Goddess, were they fickle? And both of them with their crumbs as if she should be glad to take the scraps of friendship that they offered. Well, maybe she was better off. Amy would understand. She’d been so holier than thou, sending Amy away, but of all of them Amy was the one she could trust to know how she felt.

Well, for now, it would have to be a motel, She really should have let Xander cough up for Giles’ hotel before she told him he was offering too little too late. She couldn’t change that now, though.

She picked up her bag and made her way downstairs, before dropping it on the floor and waiting in the hall. The dog’s growl informed everyone that she was there and the chatter that had been coming from the room fell silent. Spike came through and picked up the bag, carrying it for her as they made their way silently to the car. Giles followed him out, taking the front passenger seat. No one else in the room spoke to her at all.

Chapter 2.02

Spike looked in the rear-view mirror. "Where to, Red?"

"I guess it’ll have to be the Motor Lodge."

Spike nodded and put the car in gear, preparing to drop her off before taking Giles to his hotel. The drive was completed in an awkward silence. At the Motor Lodge, Spike got out of his seat and made his way to the trunk, opening it up before he said anything, just in case the Watcher could lip-read.

"You got enough money for this? Buffy owe you any rent money back?"

"Probably less than I owe on my share of the bills," the witch admitted.

"Right, then. I’ll say my piece and let you go.

I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for you, Red. There’s not many as I would offer to turn. I’m kind of picky that way, unlike some folk. That doesn’t matter, ‘cause I also, as you may have noticed, have soft spots for the slayer, her sis an’ your ex, an’ right now they’re all hurtin’ ‘cause of that stunt you pulled tonight. That makes me a mite pissed off with you and that pissed off is not goin’ to go away until they all feel better about things. When you make things right with them, then you’ll be right with me, but for now I’d give Revello a wide berth unless you know for a fact that Glinda, Bit and the mutt are all out of the picture."

"Tara? But-."

"We asked Tara if she would stay. Having her around’ll be good for her and good for the Niblet. And you’re goin’ to give her all the space she needs to make a clean break."

"And if I don’t?"

"Then, you’d best be prepared to deal with someone who’s pissed off and invulnerable, cause you won’t catch all of us on the hop."

"Are you threatening me?"

"I’m stating a fact. You harm any one of us, in any way, and whoever is left will come after you. Well, maybe not Glinda, but I’d lay bets on me and Bit and I’ve got a feelin’ Buffy will only give so far.

If you take my advice you’ll let things lie between you an’ Bit, an’ you an’ Tinkerbell for a while."

Willow hardened her mouth into a sneer. "I’ll never want your advice, Spike." She snatched her bag from his hands without touching it, using her power to levitate it, so that she needed only the lightest grasp on the handles to fool the clerk into thinking she was carrying it as she entered the motel.

* * * * *

"Tara?" Dawn knocked on the door of Buffy’s room. "Spike said I should bring you some hot chocolate and let you know he’s taken Willow away. Can I come in?"

There was just a small sniff before the Wiccan answered. "Sure, sweetie. The door’s open."

The teenager made her way into the room followed by her canine companion. The dog immediately stood in front of Tara and pushed her nose under Tara’s hands, which had been resting in her lap as they mangled a semi-soggy tissue.

"I brought a friend. We’ve all been sitting downstairs trying to come up with a name for her." Dawn handed over one mug of chocolatey goodness and took a seat next to the witch while she took a sip of her own.

"Buffy says if we don’t name her soon, the way Spike’s going, she’ll think her name is Mutt."

Tara’s lips curved up into the slightest of smiles.

"So, who’s still around?" she asked.

"Well, Spike was going to drop off Giles and the hag, and then he was going to swing past The Bronze and get mine and Brandon’s jackets and helmets from last night, but he shouldn’t be long. Wes seems to be hovering for some reason. I kinda think he wants to talk to Spike, but I don’t know why. He keeps coming up with prissy names. Things like Calliope and Persephone and stuff. Having said that, I think Callie quite suits her.

Do you like that, girl? Want to be called Callie?" Dawn lapsed into baby talk as she reached across to fondle the puppy’s ears. The dog meanwhile had succeeded in getting Tara to scratch at her head with one hand but now seemed intent on getting her nose under the blonde’s other hand, as well, the one with the cup in it. Tara was having quite the time trying to stop the puppy from tipping hot chocolate over her nose.

"What about Buffy? What did she suggest?"

"Well, first she was wanting Byron, even though she’s a girl and then she got all witty and decided we should call her Creed… ‘Cause of that song of theirs… My Sacrifice. Then she said Deefer, like D for dog. We could use some sensible ideas."

"From the person who called her cat Miss Kitty Fantastico? What did Spike say?"

"He said since she was a bitch we could call her Darla, but that seemed kinda cruel… to the dog, I mean, plus if Angel and his son end up coming up for the wedding not very tactful."

"What about Rogue? Like from the X-men but ‘cause she looks sort of like a rogue, too?" Tara suggested.

"That’s cool." Dawn turned to the dog again. "Rogue? You like Rogue, girl?" The puppy ignored her completely.

There was a crash from downstairs as the front door slammed closed and the dog turned and went running downstairs. This was followed by a muffled, "bloody hell!" before Dawn was summoned.

"Bit, get your arse down here an’ take your mutt away before she slavers all over the leather, will you?"

Dawn laughed as she made her way down the staircase, with Tara behind her. The puppy was leaping all over Spike, obviously delighted that he had returned without Willow.

"Just wait till she’s big enough to put her paws on your shoulders and lick your face," the teenager taunted, as the vampire tried alternately to back away and to push the excitable dog back down without hurting her.

"Guess who’s going to be a daddy’s girl?" Tara teased the vampire.

"Don’t start." He turned to Dawn. "D’you leave any of that for me?"

"In a mug, in the microwave, with the monkey brains already in."

Buffy’s voice sounded from the kitchen. "Already heating it up for you."

"Excuse me, ladies. Duty calls." Spike grinned and pulled his duster off, draping it over the banister in preparation for making his way through the dining room to the kitchen.

"What’s up, Spike? Cramp?" Tara asked.

A twinkle appeared in Spike’s eyes, and he turned back to kiss the Wiccan on the forehead before he went looking for his fiancée. "Maybe, Tinkerbell. If I’m really lucky."

"Okay," Dawn turned to Tara as the pair made their way through to join Wes. "Why did that last conversation sound like it was in code? And how come my dog is following him?"

* * * * *

"You two are pathetic. You know that, right? He was only away for twenty minutes and we can all see you from here."

"And that’s why the G rated greeting, Bitlet."

"Can you two physically be in the same room without holding hands or something?"

Buffy looked down at where their hands were clasped together as they joined the others in the living room. "Guess not."

The teenager gave a snort. "Well, I guess that’s kinda cool… just so long as you do keep it G rated in public." She grinned at their surprised faces. "Caught ya! Now, give me back my dog."

"I’m glad you like her, but isn’t it about time you were getting ready for bed, platelet?"

"No point. Way too excited to sleep."

Buffy stepped in at this point. "Excited or not, go get washed up and changed and no letting the dog lick you after you’ve washed." The teenager headed upstairs with obvious reluctance.

Buffy then smiled at Wes. "What about you, Wes? I’m not too sure where everyone’s going to be sleeping tonight, but at worst there’s the sofa. Then, come morning, you’ll have sobered up enough to take the bike back.

We’d normally offer to walk you back, but we don’t want to be too far from Dawn. Spike could give you a lift, though, if you’d rather."

"The sofa’s fine."

"I’ll get some sheets and stuff."

"Don’t go to all that trouble. All I need is a blanket or two to keep the draughts off."

"Pet, why don’t I take the mutt for a tour of the block, while you sort out where you’re puttin’ everyone and every… thing? An’ aside from Dawn gettin’ her dinner at biker boy’s, nobody else has eaten. Maybe you could order somethin’ up before everywhere shuts for the night."

"Mm-hm. Chinese? I’m getting near my weekly pizza limit."

"Didn’t know you had such a thing. Don’t mind what you get, just so long as you get me something sort of spicy. You and Tinkerbell work it out between you. Just make sure you all eat something. If you skip any more dinners you’ll disappear."

Wes looked vaguely embarrassed as he almost stuttered. "Em, well, I could do with stretching my legs a bit… if you don’t mind the company?"

Spike gave the former Watcher a curious glance. "Sure. More the merrier."

* * * * *

"Here, grab this a minute." Spike passed the dog’s chain to the other man, freeing up both his hands for the task of lighting a cigarette. Once he had returned his lighter to his pocket, he took the dog back from the Watcher.

"So, what’s up that you don’t want to mention in front of the slayer?"

"What? Well, nothing really. It’s not that I don’t want her to know, it’s just sort of personal and if I’m wrong…"

"If you’ve picked up some unfortunate disease it’s really a doctor you need to talk to mate."

Wes was about to protest, when he saw the laughter in Spike’s eyes and gave a wry smile instead. "If I had, according to what she told the assistant in the bike shop yesterday, your future sister-in-law would have it as well."

"You what?"

"Dawn said it was her boyfriend that owned the bike. The salesman jumped to conclusions, which she then proceeded to pander to in a quite outrageous fashion."

Spike shook his head. "That’s the Bit, alright." He took a long draw at his cigarette, releasing the smoke slowly before he continued. "But that’s not what brings you out here to walk round in circles until this beast craps out what should have been our dinner."

"It’s Lily, actually."

Spike gave the man an appraising look. "What about her? She been doing her Madame Zelda routine for you?"

"If you mean has she been handing out advice, then yes. The problem is I don’t think it was entirely unbiased."

"In what way?"

"Well, there’s this girl in LA-," Wes started.

"Texas belle, yeah?"

"Does everybody know?"

Spike shrugged. "Seemed obvious to me. Can’t say I’ve discussed it with any of the others."

"Anyway, Lily told me that I should make a clean break of it, move up here and forget about her. She told me I should be looking for a wife, a woman to start a family with, not a little girl."

"Sounds like the sort of advice that’s all very sensible, but the heart doesn’t necessarily work on logic. She told me to give up on Buffy at one point, too. It all depends how much you want something and how much you’re prepared to go through to get it."

"Yes, well, that’s not really the problem. The problem is, I have a feeling that she wasn’t just talking about any woman and I think the family she had in mind is at least partially ready-made."

"Oh!" Spike smirked as he raised his cigarette to his mouth.

"That’s it? Oh?"

"Well, I don’t know that there’s much else I can say… other than ‘Congratulations’."

"That’s not very comforting."

"You want comforting or you want the truth? If Lily’s picked you out to be the father of her grandchild, at least I assume Rosa’s the ready-made family you were talkin’ about rather than Clem…" A look of distaste crossed both men’s faces. "Then, you might as well go out, buy the ring and enjoy the ride, as fight her on it."

"And Marie? And Rosa? I know nothing about children, well, except those few weeks when Connor was a baby."

"Well, I don’t think the old bat’d be pushin’ the idea if she didn’t think Marie was ready to be seein’ someone and no first-time father knows what he’s doin’."

"Did you… When you were human, did you have any children? I mean. People married younger then."

"No," the vampire’s tone turned serious and he stopped walking, turning to look Wes in the eye as he addressed him. "No, I didn’t. Look, mate. I don’t know what the deal is with you, whether in a few years time you’ll be like Rupert an’ get a yearning for England’s pastures green and go home to the family manor and find somebody called Deirdre with another double-barrelled name. Maybe bein’ the demon hunter is just a game until daddy’s ready to pop his clogs an’ leave you the whole shooting match an’ you can go raise the eighth generation of Wyndam-Pryce Watchers."

He cast an appraising eye over the man beside him. "I don’t think that’s who you are any more, but if it is, then just stay the hell away from them all. If on the other hand, this is where you choose to be, an’ if you can look at Rosa for who she is, not what her father was, then I think what you’ll find is a wonderful but a lonely little girl. A little girl who’s more than willing and able to return any affection that happens to come her way.

Marie? Well, she’s the kind of special that doesn’t come along too often, an’ more often than not it’s gits like Hank Summers that snatch them up. Any man would be lucky to end up with a woman like that.

Neither of them would fit in if you tried to take them back to the home counties and the polo-playing prats and afternoon tea in the drawing room. They’d be stifled to death, but I figure any man worth his salt as they would include in their lives would have more sense than to leave.

An’, of course the fact that Marie happens to be the sort of drop dead gorgeous that means she’d stand out in a room full of women doesn’t hurt a bit."

Spike took one last draw on his cigarette before he flicked it away across the street, the orange glow splintering into pinpricks of light as it impacted with the asphalt.

Wes fell into step beside him again as the vampire resumed his promenade.

"So, was that your way of commiserating with me, encouraging me or warning me off?"

"That was my way of saying that if Lily gets her way, I think you would be a damn lucky man, but if you can’t make a commitment for whatever reason, then just stay away because, well, Marie can make her own choices, but if you hurt that kid, let’s just say I wouldn’t be happy."

"But do you think Marie’s in on it? Do you think she likes me?"

Spike frowned. "Let’s say, I don’t think she finds you unattractive. I’d say she’s noticed you, but I wouldn’t count on a lady like that doing any of the running. Probably, without Lily stickin’ her oar in, you’d both play coy an’ nothin’ would happen or Rosa would be age for goin’ to college by the time it did. Does that help?"

Wes glanced across at the vampire. "I really don’t know. Ask me again on Saturday night."

"What’s Saturday night?"

"Apparently, you, me and the girls are to be invited to a dinner party. Lily’s efforts on behalf of the Sunnydale welcome wagon."

"Balls!"

"I didn’t think it was that bad."

"For you, it’s not. For me it’s torture."

"I don’t understand."

"First time I went there, Clem warned me it was probably best not to let slip that I ate human food, well, food that was for humans rather than food that was humans. A tip for which I have frequently been very grateful, given what I’ve seen of Lily’s cooking, but Lily doesn’t cook at the weekends. Marie does, and it all looks and smells bloody gorgeous."

"Well," replied Wes with a smile. "If I’m going to spend the evening as Lily’s prey, at least I know I won’t be suffering alone."

Chapter 2.03

"I guess we better sort out what food we want before everywhere shuts, and then when Dawn gets back down, we can see whether she’s going to want to share a bed with Spike and me or whether Wes gets to sleep on the sofa." Buffy crossed to the kitchen cupboard where the various food delivery menus were tucked away, picking up the handset for the cordless phone on the way.

Tara followed her and they pulled out stools so that they could spread out their array in front of them. "You know, about who’s sleeping where…"

Buffy gave the girl a soft smile. "No, you can’t volunteer to take the sofa."

"You think I’m that much of a martyr, huh?"

"Nope, I just know you’re that nice a person."

"Not quite. It wasn’t really tonight as such I wanted to talk about. What I was going to say was, assuming I stay, I wouldn’t feel right about having the master bedroom.

I mean, I don’t know if you’d want to move in there until the basement’s ready, or whether you’d rather just wait and move once. Either way, it seems as if it should be someone who's really family who has that room. I guess it made sense when Willow and I were sharing, but not when there's just me."

"We’ve got plenty of time to sort all this out tomorrow, when Dawn and Spike are here. I guess, since the teenage terror volunteered us to do Willow’s packing for her, that’ll be the first priority. Then, we can work out whose things get moved into the space and fetch the rest of your things from the dorm, if that's okay with you.

Apart from anything else, it might depend on how things go with Social Services tomorrow. One of the reasons Spike took his apartment was that he was worried what they might say if he just moved in, but the case worker doesn't seem to have a problem with him being around, so if he's going to be here more, then it might make sense for us to have the bigger room, but if he's going to go back to only staying a couple of nights a week, then I guess whoever is going to be there in the long term should just move in.

And for the record..." She waited until she was sure the other girl was looking her squarely in the eye. "You are really family. In every way that counts, you're family."

With that matter resolved, Buffy moved on to more immediate concerns. "So, I know I said no more pizza, but with pizza comes Ben & Jerry's. Chinese means fritters. Not such a good score on the comfort food scale. And I'm guessing some comfort food would be good 'round about now."

"Ice cream sounds good," Tara agreed. "Or I could make pancakes, if you'd rather?"

"Nope, cooking... or housework of any kind is forbidden until tomorrow morning. We want food that comes in boxes and doesn't leave any more washing up than one spoon per person, which I guess means we get a pint of ice-cream each."

Dawn called through to the kitchen at this point, having made her way downstairs without either of the others noticing. "Did you guys mention ice cream? I had pizza at Brandon's but we didn't get ice cream."

* * * * *

"So, Giles is back. Is this just to help you out with the wedding stuff, or is it that apocalypse time of year again?" Tara asked.

"The latter. I don't think my wedding warrants two months of his precious time. He'll probably make time to give Spike 'The Talk' while he's here, though." Buffy gave a smile. "But then, if he does, I have a funny feeling he might end up on the receiving end of a lecture or two, himself."

"So what are you meant to stop, this time?"

"That's the thing. We thought it was the whole Willow, demon summoning thing... But Giles was doing the 'dark power' and I'm not even sure Evie would qualify as dirty grey."

"So, it's got to be Willow, then." Dawn added her bit to the conversation. "She's going to go majorly bad."

"Dawn..." Buffy's tone betrayed a level of exasperation. "Willow may have made mistakes, but she played a big part in finding you and she pretty much single-handedly saved Brandon's life. You can't just forget that as if it didn't happen."

"I'll have him send her a card," the teen responded bitterly. "It doesn't make her any less dangerous. She's still a manipulative, power-crazed, puppycidal bitch."

The sound of the front door opening temporarily caused a break in the conversation.

The puppy came bounding into the kitchen followed only seconds later by Spike and the former watcher.

"But you've got to reckon they've at least got a decent chance this year," the vampire was arguing.

"I'm not saying they don't have a chance-."

"Come on. If the bloody Yanks can qualify, anything can happen."

"As I said, we have a chance. I just think that realistically, in the end it's going to come down to either Germany or Brazil. Beckham's good, but he's not a miracle worker."

The puppy made her way around the group of women, while the two men were speaking, going from one to the next, getting very excited at Dawn's new apple-fragranced scent. Buffy treated the girl to a warning frown, to prevent her from fussing over the puppy when she'd supposedly washed up ready for bed. The frown was replaced by a look of dawning comprehension at the mention of Beckham's name. "Soccer. World cup, I think. Beckham's that one who married a Spice Girl." Her explanation was followed by the same look appearing on the other two girls' faces.

"So? Like you girls've been discussin' world politics?"

"No, but we have been discussing the fact that we don't really think Evie qualifies as a 'dark power' so you might not make it to your precious World Cup."

"Hey, now. You're even worse than him. Your lot's got a stake in this too, you know. You're just goin' to have to find this 'dark power' that Rupert's so fond of 'n' explain that we just can't be havin' any doin's with 'im... or her until the traitorous watcher 'ere 'n' me 'ave settled our little wager. Or you can kick his arse. That works too. We'll even help... if there isn't a match on."

"So, I have your endless devotion and support, just so long as twenty-two men aren't running round in shorts chasing a ball that isn't even the right shape?"

"Hey, she's learning. She knows how many are on a team now. But you forgot the ref, pet, so twenty-three really."

"Am I going to have to put up with this every year?" Buffy asked with a resigned expression.

"Hell, no, pet. You'll learn. It's every four years. Course, the Premier League runs every year. We'll have to get the sports channels added to the cable subscription before that starts."

She almost believed him before she caught the teasing glint in his eye. "Evil vamp!"

"Bad to the bone," Spike concurred as he swaggered across to take hold of Buffy by the waist, spin her so that she had her back to him and then picked her up as he turned round himself to rest his back against the kitchen units. His cheek brushed against Buffy's, stubble grating lightly against her soft skin, and his arms wrapped around her waist. Buffy was all too aware of the affect her proximity was having on the vamp and was torn between pulling away before it became even more obvious and staying where she was in order to hide the evidence. Her decision was further complicated by the fact that the pup seemed to find the pair of them very interesting.

"So, if Anya's luscious blue friend isn't Rupe's 'dark power' where does that leave us for suspects, other than Red?" the vamp asked, shifting his weight slightly so that Buffy felt his cock twitch against her ass. Dawn took on a smug expression at the vampire's words.

"Nowhere, exactly nowhere," Buffy said as she struggled to hide her reaction to what would appear to be a chaste and fleeting kiss to her neck, so far as all the others in the room were concerned.

"Once I pick up the keys for the house tomorrow, I was planning to head for LA to get my car and the rest of my things," Wes offered. "Once I have my books I can start checking for prophecies. There may be something I've missed until now."

"We'd offer to help but we've got the SS coming tomorrow, after we get Willow's things moved out." Buffy looked apologetic,

"I could go, maybe," Tara offered. "I only have a couple of classes tomorrow. I'm finished at eleven. I've got my driver's licence, and if it helped I could probably handle the Harley though I'm kind of more used to dirt bikes. I mean I'd rather bring the bike back than drive a car with a trailer... if you need a trailer. And it would still save you from having to get a flight down there."

All eyes suddenly focused on the shy blonde.

"Joys of an American rural upbringing," Spike suggested. "Let's guess. Come their sixteenth birthday, Donny was it? ...and all the other men in the family got cars and bikes, and all the women got something useless like a pair of earrings, but our Glinda borrowed brother's bike and taught herself, anyway."

"Pretty much." Tara blushed under the attention she was receiving.

Spike reached in his pocket and pulled out a set of keys, tossing them to her. "Might do better to take mine rather than watcher boy's pristine machine. It'll get you there and back. It runs fine, but nobody'll notice an extra scratch or two. I'd loan you the car but we're goin' to have to do some shopping tomorrow, maybe take the mutt to the vet's an' get it checked over.

Bloody hell! I feel like I'm living in the middle of the Waltons or something. You know dogs are supposed to come under the heading of food for vamps, not pets. You see what you've done to me, woman?"

Buffy shifted against him, just slightly, but enough to prove her point. "I know exactly what I've done to you... And you love it all."

The vampire merely grunted in response. "Pet, how long have we got before the food arrives?"

Buffy checked the kitchen clock. "Another fifteen minutes unless they're early."

"In that case seein' as I think we're out of 'dark power' candidates to discuss, I'm going to go grab a shower and get rid of the dog smell before I eat."

Spike stuck his hands in the pockets of his coat making sure that when he sidestepped from behind Buffy the leather would screen from view the tangible evidence of his arousal.

He had been upstairs less than a minute when Buffy made her excuses and followed him. "He's going to need some fresh towels. I best go find some."

"Like he couldn't find the linen closet on his own." Dawn snorted as her sister headed upstairs. "At least they're not quite as obvious as Xander and Anya. And Buffy doesn't send me off to spend the night at other people's houses any more."

Wesley flushed slightly. "I'm sure they're not..."

"Okay." Dawn suggested. "It should take Buffy two minutes to go up there, find some towels, and give them to the pseudo-albino. Ten dollars gets you twenty that neither of them shows until after the pizza."

"I really don't feel that this is a seemly topic for a wager," Wes argued.

"Or you think I'm right but you don't want to admit it?"

"Or I think you're right and I won't admit it."

Tara gave a quiet smile but her eyes sparkled behind her curtain of hair. "I'm sure she's just going to help him with those hard to reach areas."

* * * * *

Buffy checked her own room first, but found only a pile of discarded clothing. Scooping an armful of fresh towels from the closet on the landing as she passed, she pushed open the bathroom door to find the naked vampire just turning on the shower to let the temperature stabilise before he got in.

"Need a hand scrubbing your back?" she asked, as she set the bundle of towels on the floor beside the bath.

"That depends. Bit sleepin' in her own bed tonight?" Spike asked as he tenderly brushed a stray hair from her cheek.

"She's going to give it a try."

"In that case let's not start anything that we're not going to have time to finish properly. Remember the last time we got carried away in here, and how you felt after. This time the whole house would know." His tongue ran along his upper teeth. "Not that they won't all know later, anyway."

With a good-natured swat to his behind Buffy turned to go. "You know, if you build up all this anticipation then the main event's going to have to be pretty spectacular, or it's going to seem like an anti-climax."

"Have I ever given you reason to doubt?"

"We-ell... There was that one time when Xander interrupted."

"Hey, now! Extenuating circumstances. He'd make anybody lose the mood," Spike protested. "Well, except the demon bint."

Buffy dropped a kiss on his cheek. "Best hurry. Food'll be here soon. And before you come to bed tonight...get a shave."

She turned away from him, drawing her eyes from his nakedness with obvious reluctance. She hesitated for a second or two with the door ajar before she closed it once again, and locked the two of them in together. Spike's head tilted to one side and that deliciously scarred eyebrow arched upwards. She reached toward him, her fingers skating over the still shiny scar tissue where his neck met his shoulder. The tantalising touch was enough to break the demon's reserve even before her mouth replaced her fingertips.

His hands pulled her close against him, then slid over the rounded curves of her butt to part her denim-clad thighs and lift her until she wrapped her legs around his waist. The change in their relative position not only made it easier for Buffy to kiss and nibble and bite at that area of flesh where, despite Dru's efforts, he still appeared to be singularly attuned to his mate's touch but brought her own neck easily within Spike's reach at the same time, and the vampire wasn't slow to return the favour.

Each touch of his tongue, his lips and his teeth seemed to pull at the muscles of her womb, leaving her wet with desire. Her jeans crushed her lower lips so tight that the whole area seemed to burn. The rush of hot water against her skin made her gasp and she renewed her efforts with increased vigour, goaded on by the knowledge that for Spike to have carried them to the bath his legs must still be considerably less unsteady than her own. Then, her back was slammed against the cool tile of the wall.

Spike growled in her ear even as his hands massaged her breasts his thumbs tracing her wet hard nipples through the translucent fabric of her top. "Clothes, off, now, love. Or I rip them off." As if to emphasise his point his hips ground hard into hers where he had her pinned.

"Do it!" Buffy ordered, inciting him even further. One long sensuous rip split her top from hem to neckline and cool hands slid it from her shoulders. Sharp demon teeth teased at each of her nipples in turn. The knowledge that one extra ounce of pressure could leave her scarred for life only excited her further as her fingers wrapped themselves into his white-blonde curls.

"Stand up, baby." Buffy somewhat belatedly mourned the fate of one of her favourite pairs of boots as she realised why her feet failed to find purchase against the slick porcelain of the bath.

She expected the blonde to start at the fly of her jeans. Instead, he swiftly removed her footwear, kissing each bare toe before returning her foot to the surface of the bath. Then he gripped the bottom hem of one of her jean legs, ripping apart the heavy wet denim along the outer seam as if it were no more than thinnest muslin. The other leg swiftly followed, and Buffy was left in no more than a scrap of scarlet lace. Two taloned fingers flicked out with unerring precision to slice through the delicate fabric while leaving her flesh unmarred.

The display of tempered strength and violence had her panting in anticipation as he scooped her from the bath, laying her on the floor so that her hips were cushioned by the bundle of towels that she had brought him earlier.

As he came to lie above her his dick was pinned between their bodies and he supported himself on his elbows. His eyes were a glowing gold as he teased her.

"Tell me what you want, baby. Tell me... Do you want my fingers?" As he spoke he matched gestures to words, morphing back to human form so that his talons wouldn't graze her sensitive flesh he slipped a finger between her outer lips, spreading them open as he savoured their dampness. His thumb found her clit, grinding it in slow circles against her pubic bone until her muscles loosened at his touch and he slipped his middle two fingers into her moist heat. He moved them in slow circles, stretching her open wider before he added a third finger, beginning to piston them in and out.

"Is that good, my love? Is that what you want?" Even as he spoke the first flutterings of her vaginal muscles told him he was unlikely to get a coherent answer. His poor baby had been all wound up for nearly three days now. She was so ready for him. "Who's your man? Who makes you feel good?"

Buffy tried desperately to hold off her climax, knowing if she let the moment pass it could be a long time before she plucked up the courage again.

"Spike? Want you... Want your dick inside me. Want your teeth in my neck. Want to put my mark on you again."

The vampire had to bite down on his tongue to prevent himself from coming all over her stomach.

"Whatever you say, love." In one deep thrust he buried himself inside her. He withdrew slowly, only to ram home forcefully once more as Buffy flattened her feet against the floor and pushed up with her hips to meet him. She reached to twine her fingers with his then spread her arms so that he collapsed against her, his full weight pressing her to the floor as they moved. Buffy soon found herself teetering once more at the edge of the precipice as Spike moved gradually faster and harder inside her and against her.

She raised her head to capture his lips and he knew that it was time. He switched to his demon face as he teased Buffy's tongue with his own. When she pressed her tongue against one of his fangs spilling precious slayer's blood in his mouth his hips seemed to press into her with even more vigour. Then as they simultaneously bit into the other's neck with one last thrust he spilled his seed inside her as her spasming muscles milked him dry.

"Mine." Spike was the first of the two to collect enough brain cells to speak before lapping softly at her wound with his bleeding tongue.

"Always...” Buffy gasped. “Mine?"

"For eternity and beyond."

"Even if there's soccer on the TV?" Buffy raised an eyebrow in a gesture that imitated his own.

"Even when there's footie on the telly."

"Oh God!" Buffy's words mirrored the vampire's own thoughts as a pulsing began in his temples and his eyes locked with hers for a second before his lids closed and he felt the visions start.

This time, they were a warning and from the emotions that were coming from his fiancée as they clasped each other’s hands even tighter, it was one that they had both heard loud, if not exactly clear.

Chapter 2.04

Willow stared at her face in the mirror. If she didn’t know better, she’d say that some of those lines seemed to be etched just a trace deeper than a few hours ago, but that had to be her imagination.

Just the same, it looked like she was going to have to head for home, at least until the start of the fall term and that meant she had to do something about how she looked before she met her parents.

A general reversal spell should do it. She could wait, endure Anya being patronising and get the necessary ingredients to do it the easy way. Components and the like might help. Nevertheless, if you had enough raw power, then most of the time, for the simple stuff you could just bulldoze your way through. Of course, that way of doing things had the no waiting, no Anya, no money to spend bonus going for it, now that Giles seemed to be getting snippy about her using things from the shop. It fleetingly crossed her mind to wonder who had actually paid for that Urn of Osiris.

She shifted into lotus position on the bed, albeit with a little more difficulty than was normal, trying to ignore the protesting squeaks that the mattress made with her every move. She focused on her reflection in the mirror and began to chant.

She tried the simplest spells first, telling herself that it was just her imagination that the grey in her hair seemed to be getting denser and her skin drier as she continued. As to her nightshirt getting tighter, that was preposterous. It was four sizes too big, designed to incorporate an array of shoulder pads. There was still plenty of room in there.

Then, when these simple hexes failed to have the required effect she moved on to bigger and more complex magics, or at least normally, using all the correct components they would be more complex. After a couple of these she could no longer deny the cumulative ageing effect. Obviously, this wasn’t going to be quite so easy as she had thought.

Switching tactics, she tried a simple glamour. Her relief, when the spell appeared to work, was tempered by what she was now sure were half a dozen additional grey hairs when she allowed the illusion to drop.

Oh God! She was going to be stuck like this forever. Or not. It seemed like every time she used magic she was worsening the effect. Maybe she’d eventually just shrivel up and die. Maybe if she called a Scooby meeting they could… But that was right. She wasn’t a Scooby any more. No doubt she wouldn’t even be invited to the next meeting and if she tried to call one they would probably all be busy having sex and playing with puppy dogs and wouldn’t be able to come.

It wasn’t like she had wanted to sacrifice the dog, but that had been what it said in the book. And it had been to help Dawn, even if Giles had denied it. She had heard her and Buffy that morning. Spike had left the bedroom door ajar when he headed out back. She’d heard both of them say that they wished it had just never happened. Then they had turned on her as if she were a criminal when she tried to make their wishes come true. It really wasn’t fair to put the blame on her for doing what they had wanted.

And Tara… What was she going to do without Tara?

Suddenly, what she looked like, what her parents were going to say and what her friends thought, didn’t seem so important.

How did everything get to be so screwed up all at the same time? Relaxing from her upright position she curled into a foetal ball and cried herself to sleep.

* * * * *

Dawn was looking rather pleased with herself by the time the pizza arrived without an appearance from either her sister or their live-in vamp. When the couple did arrive, her sister looking just as freshly scrubbed as the vampire who had professed his wish to clean up, it was only the serious expressions on both their faces that prevented her from taunting them openly. Instead she stuck to the safe topic of food.

"There’s a couple of slices of the hot and spicy and a couple of the pineapple in the oven keeping warm, and there’s a pint of Phish Food in the freezer."

Spike ruffled her hair as he passed en route to the oven. "Thanks, Bit." Buffy took a seat on the sofa next to where her younger sister was loading up on Chunky Monkey straight from the carton. She pulled up her tanned legs toward her chest hugging them against the black satin of her pyjama top. Her eyes rarely left Spike, except when the kitchen counters obscured her view of the jean-clad, shirtless vampire.

"Is something up?" Tara just beat Wes to the question.

Buffy managed a half-hearted smile. "Just the fact that me and Spike seem to be giving the old slayer dreams package a whole new twist. It’ll keep. We can do the whole Scooby meeting thing when you and Wes get back from LA."

"Are you sure?" Wes asked. "If this really is a slayer dream then perhaps we should be working on it straight away."

Spike came back into the living room at this point, a plate laden with pizza in one hand and a couple of spoons and an ice-cream carton in the other.

"Feel free. Why don’t you ring up and have a word with any of your ex-brethren that might just be lurking in Istanbul? See if they’ve got any news," he suggested as he took a seat on the arm of the sofa next to Buffy, one arm wrapping around her shoulders once his burdens had been safely deposited on the coffee table in front of the couch.

"We don’t know…" Buffy interrupted and then tailed off. "Maybe it was a warning. Maybe it hasn’t happened."

"’F you say so, pet. I guess you’ve been having these things long enough to know." His tone, however, held none of the hope contained within his words. Spike knew that the girl they had seen was already dead. What he didn’t know, yet, was why Buffy was more than normally freaked by what had killed her.

"It’s the First Evil, or at least it was one of its minions who attacked the girl. A bringer, harbinger, something like that," Buffy told the watcher.

"And that was all you saw. A girl attacked by one of these harbingers? And how did you know it was Istanbul?"

Spike simply gave the watcher a look that said as clearly as if he had spoken that he hadn’t spent his entire unlife in London and California. Then, he elaborated on what they had seen. "Just that and some freaky goat head pentagram thing, looked like it belonged in an Alchemy catalogue."

"Wasn’t there something like that in that old Dan Ackroyd movie, with the satanic cult or something," Dawn asked.

"Hardly a stellar point of reference, pet."

"And what makes you think this has anything to do with the Council?"

"Can you think of any other reason why Buffy would be dreaming, ‘bout a girl that age? ‘Sides, she had the look."

"But why?" Wes asked. "There will always be more girls to take her place. There’s no guarantee that the girl would ever have even become a slayer."

Spike shrugged. "Demon I knew thought he could end the line, or even just weaken it. Get a run of untrained eight-year-olds and your slayer brand is going to suffer significantly. Might even get themselves a slayer they can control, keep prisoner, whatever."

"So you’re saying they’re going to kill all the girls who could become slayers?" Dawn asked.

"We’re guessin’, pet, but I think they’re goin’ to try."

"And then? What happens then? These eight year-olds you’re talking about are only going to be called if the slayer dies. Right? They’re going to come after Buffy, aren’t they?" Dawn sounded panicked.

"No, love. They’re not. No reason why they should, unless Wes’s old lot’s been keepin’ secrets and they’ve got another slayer stashed away in Cleveland or somewhere."

"Not that I’m aware of," Wes admitted. "Though it’s not outside the realms of possibility."

"Then, Buffy is irrelevant to the continuity of the line. Soon as Miss Trinidad & Tobago got her calling, any extra that Buffy did was just icing on the cake. When she died last year, no new slayer. That means it’s our little jailbird who’s at the end of the line." Spike defied anyone to refute his logic and of course Dawn did.

"But how do we know there isn’t another slayer? She could just be in the middle of communist China, or one of those places in Africa where there’s some sort of civil war going on all the time. We didn’t know Faith existed until she just turned up, or Kendra. We don’t know."

"His lot knew." Spike nodded toward Wes. "And the demons knew. I should’ve picked up on it before slayer number two showed her face in Sunnyhell that first time, but all that ‘There can be only one’ stuff didn’t exactly encourage me to listen to any rumours. I mean, so you hear there’s some slayer down in the Caribbean. If you know for a fact that there’s one in California, you tend to just think someone somewhere’s tellin’ porky pies. ‘Course I didn’t realise that Buffy had actually died. You Scoobies just never thought to ask. I trailed my butt round every demon haunt within half a night’s drive last summer. No one knew anything about a third slayer."

"Either way, it would seem wise to alert Faith and the Council to our suspicions. I’ll speak to Angel tomorrow. I believe he has kept in contact with her." Wes volunteered to pass on the news.

"Are you sure you want to do that? We could call him just as easily," Buffy offered.

"It’s okay. I need to fetch some of my books, anyway. Somehow when they packed up my things for me, they failed to take into account that most of their reference materials were actually my reference materials."

"That was rather remiss of them," Spike observed with a sly grin.

"But not entirely unexpected, given Angel’s past actions," countered Wes, remembering how he had marched into their interim LA office to claim some book. "He never did grasp the finer points of ownership, though I doubt he’ll make the trip all the way to Sunnydale when he needs a book."

At this point Spike just happened to glance across at the plate he had, mere minutes earlier, stacked with pizza. Only the pineapple slices remained, but he knew that Buffy had been too preoccupied to bother eating any. He bent over and craned his neck to look beneath the table.

"Bloody hell!" he swore at the sight of the puppy crunching the last of the crust from his hot and spicy. "Angel’s not the only one, neither. Bit, your damned mutt’s just eaten my bloody dinner… again!"

Dawn just smirked. "Well, I guess that settles it. Rogue, it is."

"She’s your dog, Niblet. That means it’s your job to train her, which also means you’re the one that gets to smack her or blow up her nose or whatever you do when she pulls a stunt like that."

"You can’t smack her," Dawn protested. "And what’s with the blowing up her nose?"

"I’m not going to smack her. Just told you that’s your job, and the blowing up its nose, can’t remember really if that’s for dogs or horses but if it works don’t knock it. So?" The vampire stared down the teenager until she finally conceded defeat.

"I’ll shut her in the bathroom, okay? Does that class as punishment enough?"

"No. It’s not. The mutt’s going to be sleeping in there at night until she’s housetrained. You start using that as a punishment, and she’s going to think she’s done something wrong when she hasn’t."

The vampire seemed to give up on getting the teenager to discipline the pup. Instead, he pulled the dog out from under the table, pointed her head toward the half-empty plate, hoping she would understand what she was being reprimanded for. Then, with a curl of his lip and a flash of fang he gave a growl that had the pup whimpering and dashing to the safety of Dawn’s shadow when he released her.

The vampire’s attention returned to Buffy. She still hadn’t touched any of her food. "Come on, pet. Why don’t you head for bed? Me an’ Bit’ll get the watcher and the mutt settled. I’ll stick your ice cream back in the freezer an’ you can get it another time. Okay?"

"I guess. I put us in mom’s room. I figured that way, since I don’t need so much sleep, I could get an early start on the packing."

"That’s fine, love." The vampire picked up the remains of the pizza, and the ice cream, dumping the former in the trash and the latter in the freezer. He returned to the main room to extend a hand to the slayer pulling to her feet. His arm wrapped around her shoulders and he walked her up to her mother’s room and tucked her up in the freshly-made bed like a little girl.

"Won’t be long, precious." He placed a gentle kiss on her forehead.

A dim smile flickered across her lips for an instant. "I’ll be right here… Gollum."

The vampire immediately dropped into a hunch-shouldered, semi-upright stance as he made his way to the door. "Yesss, masster" he replied in passable impersonation of Tolkein’s unfortunate, only to run into Dawn on the landing.

"Okay, I knew you guys were weird, but Quasimodo and Esmerelda. That’s just warped. And shouldn’t you have the bumpies for that?"

Spike raised his eyes heavenward. "Wasn’t-. Never mind. Let’s just get everybody to bed, right?"

Soon, Wes had phoned Giles at his hotel to inform him of the latest developments and everyone except Spike was settled in their respective rooms, but the vampire had one last task in mind before he retired for the night. He knocked softly on the door to Buffy’s room.

"Come in," Tara answered equally quietly.

Spike opened the door, leaning against the frame as he spoke. "Hey, love. Just me. How are you doin’?"

The Wicca gave a brave smile. "Better than if I was in a dorm all on my own. It’s not like you get the chance to dwell on things, with everything that’s going on."

"Yeah, well, from experience, the dwelling’ll probably start round about when that damp patch on the ceiling loses its fascination. An’ if it does, remember we’re always there. The door’s always open." He flashed her a lascivious grin. "Just make sure you knock before you come in.

Seriously, though, any time you want to talk, or just some company watching the telly, or a hug, whatever… you know you’ve got an open invitation, day or night, right?"

"I’ll bear it in mind."

With what he hoped was a comforting smile and a nod, Spike pulled the door closed as he left.

He slipped quietly into the darkened room where his girl was waiting for him. Before he pulled his jeans off and changed into the pyjama bottoms Buffy had brought through for him when she organised the sleeping arrangements, he checked that all the curtains were firmly closed. A dark lump at the bottom of the bed caught his attention and he realised that the connecting door to the bathroom was open.

"We have to have the mutt?" he asked.

"She was whining. At least now she’s quiet."

With a sigh the vampire slipped into bed, pushing the dog out of his way with his feet, his arms wrapping Buffy round from behind, with all the strength and comfort he could give her.

"So, love, what’s the big deal with this First guy. Seems to me, if you know him, that means you already sent him off once with his tail between his legs. You’ll do it again."

"The deal…" Buffy turned in his arms her eyes searching for his in the darkness. "The deal is that last time, it went after someone I loved, and if it wasn’t for some freak weather, they would have killed themselves.

The deal is… I can’t lose you. Not now. Not ever. I need you."

"No, Buffy, you don’t. You’re strong. If something happens to me, you’ll do just fine. I’m bettin’ you would kick the ass of whatever was to blame from here to hell and back.

But so long as I have any say in the matter, I won’t be goin’ anywhere. Like I said earlier, I’m yours, body, spirit and mind, and so long as I have any choice at all, I won’t ever leave you. Unless this thing or its guys come and stick a stake through my chest, I won’t be leaving. I’ll never just quit on you. I’m not planning on any daylight walks without those orbs around, or at least a good thick blanket."

"It can’t be killed. So long as there’s evil inside any of us, it will exist."

"But it can be beaten," Spike insisted. "You’ve done it before. And these harbingers, they can be killed, and whatever the deal is with the goat thing, we can deal with that."

"You make it sound so simple."

"Because as long as I have you, then everything else is simple."

His lips met hers in a tender caress that swiftly became more passionate as Buffy returned the kiss. As always, the bond between them relayed their feelings and in the depths of their hearts they were each a little afraid, but more importantly they had a confidence built on their mutual faith and love and a determination to see this through. Spike was right. At the end of the day one or both of them might fail, but neither of them were about to quit. So, the First Evil was going to have a real fight on its hands this time.

Soon, all thoughts of anything other than each other were banished from their minds, even the thought that they had a canine voyeur sharing the bed with them.

Chapter 2.05

"Hey, lazybones. Time you were up." Buffy tried to gently chivvy the vamp into wakefulness.

"Wha’? Whatimesit?" Spike stalled pulling Buffy closer.

"Em, well, it’s five thirty two."

Spike pulled the covers back over his head. "In the a.m.?" he asked.

"Well, yes, but I need you and your amazing vamp climbing abilities."

"At this time in the morning, unless I haven’t actually been to bed yet, I can tell you there’s only one thing I’m interested in climbing."

"Well, Mount Buffy is about to get up and start dealing with this room so that we have a hope of getting everything packed by the time Dawn said it would be ready."

"And where are my climbing abilities supposed to fit into the picture? You want me to hang a trapeze above the bed, now that we’ve got the room to ourselves?"

"No. Does your brain ever get out of the bedroom?"

"Not when you’re in it."

"The bedroom or your brain?"

"Either," the vampire responded with a wicked grin.

"And why a trapeze? I never really got that…"

"Then I guess we’ll have to find different accommodation next time it’s just the two of us in LA so that you can see for yourself."

"You know hotels with trapezes in the bedrooms?"

"Well… I never said it was a hotel as such… More like a brothel, but we can rent the room without the room service."

"You!" Buffy’s gasp of outrage was swiftly silenced as Spike wound his fingers through her hair and pulled her close for a kiss, but as soon as she was able to regain her breath her protests continued.

"I can’t believe you think I would go to a brothel with you. That is so humiliating."

"And that is so narrow-minded. Guess I better cancel the booking for the first night of our honeymoon, then."

"Did your brain get fried with all this going out in the sun or something? Why would you ever think that I would go to a brothel with you?"

"Looks like it did." Spike rolled to the edge of the bed and stood up, going in search of the jeans he had abandoned last night. As soon as he spotted them he pulled them on, the rip of his zipper being pulled up sounding a death knell for the discussion.

"So? What was this climbing that you wanted doing?" Spike asked his tone harsh.

"When we moved in, we flattened all the cardboard boxes and stored them up in the crawlspace."

The vampire grunted and had left the room before she could respond. Needless to say when Buffy moved to follow him, pulling the top sheet from the bed to wrap around herself, she was almost run over by the puppy in Rogue’s effort to beat her out of the door.

When she made it to the landing, the hatch to the crawlspace was already open and cardboard boxes were raining down through the hole. However, only a fraction of the boxes she had expected appeared before the vamp swung down and tipped the hatch cover back into place as he dropped silently to the floor again.

"Is that it?" she asked indicating the sparse half dozen boxes.

"I’m goin’ to go with yes, seein’ as how the rest of the boxes up there were all between the leak in the roof and the damp patch on your ceiling, but if my word’s not good enough then feel free to climb up there for yourself."

"Spike? Please…" Still clutching the sheet with one hand she reached out with her other to try to smooth away a patch of dust that decorated one of the vampire’s sharply defined cheekbones.

"Please, what? What would madame like now? Let me guess it must be my job to clean up the dog crap in the bathroom, after all it was my dinner it ate so it must be my job. Or did I miss doing the breakfast in bed? Can’t be that you’ve got an itch needs scratchin’ ‘cause I’m sure I offered just before you got all ‘Prime of Miss Jean Brodie’ on me."

"Well, pardon me if I don’t want to spend the first night of our married lives in a brothel."

"Don’t worry about it. I’m sure we can get a nice room at a nice suburban Holiday Inn instead. I’ll give the contract to Anya. I’m sure she’ll appreciate the thought even if you’re too damned uptight."

"Well maybe in that case you should have beat Xander to it and married her instead of me."

"Well, you know, there’s times I think I’d be better off."

The words sank into a well of silence and when Buffy finally spoke her voice was tremulous and unsure. "Really?"

Spike’s voice softened in return. "On a very rare occasion when I’ve fried my brain from too much sun, but soon as I see you smile the idea goes straight out of my head."

"So you don’t really wish you’d married Anya?"

"Pet, if you don’t know by now that I love you in a way I have never loved anyone else in my entire existence then I’ve obviously been inadvertently speaking Swahili for the last two years."

Dawn’s head appeared at the doorway to her room. "You know, arguing at this time of the morning in public is way antisocial, but can you at least do the making up in private?"

"Not really," Buffy answered, "seeing as how you’re going to be in the bathroom cleaning up the mess your dog left last night."

"Hey, I’m not up. I’m supposed to be resting. I was just wanting you two to be quiet so I could go back to sleep."

"Think again. For one thing, if Spike ends up being the one to clear that up then I would suspect that dog might well be making a return visit to the pound. And for another, you’re the one that said we would pack Willow’s stuff so don’t think you’re going to sit in bed and paint your nails while we do all the work."

"I was thinking more of lying in bed and sleeping…" Dawn’s protests died at the expression on her sister’s face. "But I guess I’ll just get dressed and clean up the bathroom."

"Good call, Bit."

Buffy waited until Dawn had gone and then led the vampire down to the kitchen, taking him through the dining room to try to avoid disturbing Wesley. She got him to sit down while she put the coffeemaker on and set a mug of blood to microwave. Then, while they waited, she came to stand between his knees, her arms wrapping around his neck, so that they were eye to eye.

"Now, were you serious about having booked us in at a brothel for our honeymoon?"

"Just the one night," Spike grudgingly admitted.

"Why?"

Spike shrugged. "Look, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Just forget it. We’ll do something else. It doesn’t matter."

"But it obviously does, otherwise you wouldn’t have got all uptight about it."

"I wasn’t the uptight one. Just forget it, pet. I’ll give it to Anya like I said. Her an’ …him’ll have a hell of a time."

"Look, I’m sorry. Another time maybe… just not… not then." Buffy’s eyes implored him to understand, to lose the kicked puppy air that seemed to hang over him. "Our wedding night should just be about you and me and how we feel about each other. Not sexcapades hanging from a trapeze."

"Which bit of "forget it" didn’t you understand, Buffy? Just drop it. I get the message. I fucked up. Why don’t you just arrange whatever you want? Just so long as it doesn’t involve me turning into a big pile of dust, I don’t really care. I’m obviously just too incompetent to be left to organise anything on my own."

The vampire pushed his stool back away from her and grabbed a roll of trash bags from under the sink before heading back upstairs. Buffy was grateful, despite the early hour, when the phone rang giving her something other than the circling mug of blood in the microwave and holding her sheet up for her to concentrate on.

"Hi, Summers residence."

"Buffy, it’s Anya."

"Talk of the devil," Buffy muttered under her breath but the former demon seemed oblivious.

"I wasn’t sure if you would be up or not, but I thought if you were, since Xander said you were moving Willow out that you might need help. Moving’s a friends thing, right? Oh and I found out some news last night that you might be interested in."

Then Buffy heard Xander’s voice in the background, a much beset moan of, "Ahn?"

"Oh, and Xander wants to know where Spike took Willow last night. She’s not answering her cell and he wants to make some futile effort to stop her before she tries to reverse Evie’s curse, but I told him he was bound to be too late already, but he’s all guilty because he didn’t think to tell her about how the curse worked when she rang last night. So now he’s trying to take it out on everyone else."

"And just out of curiosity, how does the curse work?"

"Well, it’s really clever… But are you sure you don’t want me to save this for when I come to help? That way I can tell you all at once."

"Sure, that sounds good."

"Should I bring doughnuts, too?"

"Doughnuts would be the best thing about this morning so far," the slayer sighed.

"I’ll get Xander to drop me off on his way to work, then."

Xander’s voice sounded in the background again. "Ahn? Willow?"

"Look, Anya, how about I track down Spike and get him to call you back?"

"I thought he was staying with you until Wesley either went back to LA or found a place of his own."

"He is. He’s just-. Wait a minute." Buffy turned her attention to her sister, who had just walked through the living room into the kitchen. "Dawn, go see if you can find Spike and find out where he dropped Willow last night."

The teenager rolled her eyes and passed Buffy a newspaper wrapped bundle. "Hold this till I get back."

Buffy tried to work out how to hold the sheet, the phone and the bundle of dubious provenance that she had been given by her sister. The longer she held the parcel the more sure she became of what was in it, and the more sure she was that she didn’t want to be holding it at all. Maybe this whole puppy deal had been a bad call.

Dawn came trundling back downstairs with a slight limp that reminded Buffy that maybe she shouldn’t be running messages after all.

"Have you opened up that scab on your leg again?"

Dawn shrugged. "It’s just a little bit. Spike’ll clean it up for me after breakfast. And he says she’s at the shitty motel by the off-ramp."

"The Sunnydale Motor Lodge."

"Well unless there are suddenly two shitty motels by the off-ramp, I suspect that would be the one."

"Is this what I think it is?" she asked as passed the bundle back to the teenager.

"Well, you’re the one who told me to clean it up."

"Outside bin, now."

"Where did you think I was going when you interrupted me? And what the heck have you done to him this morning? If he wasn’t a vampire and a guy I would swear he had PMS."

Buffy waved her sister toward the back door. "Anya, hi, you can tell Xander she’s at the Sunnydale Motor Lodge."

"Okay, I’ll see you in about half an hour."

"Sure… and Anya?"

"Mm-hm?"

"In case I forget to say it later… Thanks."

A bleary-eyed Wes, stumbled into the kitchen at this point, dressed in a more rumpled version of yesterday’s clothes. "I guess it’s officially morning, then?"

* * * * *

"See? Like I said it’s really clever. It means if she goes really bad, then, she’ll probably kill herself before she can kill too many other people. And… if she actually studies all the proper books and learns all the stuff about the nature of magic and how to use it properly and she isn’t too conceited to pay attention to it, then she’ll be back to looking her own age within a couple of years of study. Well, near as she can, with the blood on her hands."

Anya, along with all the current occupants of the house were gathered in the living room, having coffee and doughnuts before the serious business of moving Willow’s stuff could begin. Wes had retreated to Spike’s apartment, in search of a shower, some clean clothes, and Buffy suspected another hour or two of sleep. Noticeably, the engaged couple were separated by most of the length of the sofa, one dog and one teenager. Spike had already filled several trash bags with clothes and bedding and deposited then on the front porch, but that was as far as anyone had got by the time the former vengeance demon arrived.

"B-but didn’t we stop her? I thought we got there before she could…" Tara began to argue and then realised that everyone else in the room seemed to know something she didn’t.

"Well," Anya continued. "According to what Evie saw in her head, you know that Madre de Dios or Sangre de Madre or whatever that she told us she bought on the black market? Guess what? It just slipped her mind that she went out that morning and murdered Bambi’s mom."

Tara looked even more crestfallen than the others.

"You all knew. Didn’t you?"

Buffy sighed. "Spike and Giles suspected. The rest of us found out last night."

"I don’t get it," Dawn announced. "You knew that she would have killed Rogue, but you’re acting like this is a bigger deal again."

"Because to a Wiccan it should be. The deer is a symbol of innocence and purity. It’s probably about the worst sort of sacrifice she could have made, short of human."

"So, like I said," Anya continued. "In theory, she should be able to reverse the ageing, but in practice the only way to overcome the blood on her hands would be some sort of massive sacrifice on her part."

"So, your friend Evie is basically forcing her to be good?" Tara asked.

"Well, you could say that, but it’s not so much about forcing her to be good or evil as forcing her to examine her own actions in comparison to a code she claims to adhere to.

I mean Evie has no qualms about the men I’ve tortured and killed. She wouldn’t think twice about the stuff that Spike’s done, either. I mean it’s not her personal style and Willow should be grateful for that, but she’s not the type to condemn anyone for a bit of slaughter. I think it was the hubris of the whole thing that tee-ed her off, especially coming from someone whose supposed religion is all about the opposite."

"The who-what?" Dawn asked.

"Hubris… Prideful insolence," Anya explained.

"And you say the more she tries to reverse it, the worse it’ll get?" Dawn asked.

"Well, of course, because that would be a selfish use of magic. And to judge from what I heard of her conversation with Xander I was right about him being a bit too late with the warning."

"Cool."

"Dawn!" her sister reprimanded the teen.

"I don’t see what’s wrong with speaking my mind. Seems to me that Willow had it coming. It also seems like you promised days ago to tell me how this was all her fault and you never have."

It was Tara who answered the teen. "After the meeting at Lily’s, Willow sent Sam an email. I think she thought she could warn them off."

"But it had the opposite effect." The teenager finished for her. "That’s what she meant about me being an object lesson. I got to pay the price for Willow’s arrogance."

"That’s the way it looks from here, love." Spike spoke for the first time since Anya had arrived.

"God. I wish I hadn’t kicked her ass out already, so that I could do it again." 

Spike bent over from his position on the arm of the sofa to kiss the teenager on the top of her head and drape an arm around her shoulders. Buffy looked on and was ashamed to find that she was jealous of her own sister as the vampire gently stoked her hair.

"Oh, and I’ve got some other news," Anya babbled. "Evie could remember the last slayer and vampire who were mated."

"So what happened to them?" Buffy asked

"That’s just it. Nobody knows. Just one day, next slayer appears and no one ever saw either of them again, dead or undead. Evie said there were all sorts of theories. She thinks the Council killed them both, but that’s really just one possibility. This was all about a couple of hundred years before my time, though, so it’s not as if I can make any sort of first-hand assessment."

"That settles it then, pet. Once this woman from Social Services has been, you get to keep the marbles."

"Don’t be silly. They’re far more useful to you, with the daylight thing."

"Reckon I’ll just have to be silly, along with all my many other faults, ‘cause being able to go out in daylight won’t mean a damn to me with you dead."

"Em, guys. Weren’t you meant to be not discussing the daylight thing in the house?" Tara reminded them.

"Balls! Well, I guess if that wanker Finn’s still listening, he can go shag a sheep or whatever it is that they grow in Iowa."

"Look, remind me when I get back from LA," the Wicca told them. "I think I can disable any bugs or cameras they have in the house. I wasn’t sure how to do it without taking out the phones and stuff as well but I think I have a lead on how to adjust the spell. I just need to do some more research before I try it."  

"Thanks, pet," Spike smiled over at the Wicca and it began to seem to Buffy that everyone in the room was basking in the warmth that was non-sarky Spike except her. 

"No biggie. I mean I’ll be living here, too, so it’s in my own best interest." 

The rest of the "meeting" passed in a blur for Buffy as she got to watch the vampire seemingly manage a half-hearted smile for everyone except her. Then, when Anya volunteered to do the washing up, she saw how he slipped from the room when he thought no one was looking. And to judge from the smile on the former demon’s face when she opened the envelope that he gave her and read what was inside, the vampire might have given her The Hope Diamond rather than a night for two in a whorehouse.

Buffy even began to wonder if he was right. Maybe it was her who was being uptight, or maybe it was some shard of self-respect that you lost along the way if you were ever demonised. Doubtless Xander would have something to say on the subject, but then she wasn’t sure if it would help her case or destroy it.

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