Title: Rendezvous in Rome
Author: Christine
Email: Buffygirl43@hotmail.com
Rating: R
Summary: Post 'Chosen'. Set in the present time, May - June 2004 and after the Angel episode 'The Girl in Question'. What happens when the person Dawn loves comes back?

Part Two


Breathe Dawn, breathe. In and out. In and out.

Before she knew what was happening, her feet had left the floor and Xander's strong arms held her tightly, wrapping themselves around her small waist. She took a deep breath in and for the first time in over a year, his familiar scent warmed her heart. Her arms automatically went around his neck and she clung to him as if her life depended on it. She could feel his facial hair graze her cheek and relished the feeling. She had been waiting for this moment every day since last summer. His grip loosened and her feet once again touched the cold tiled floor. She took a half step back to get a good look at him. His hair had gotten a little shaggier, and his muscles... well he obviously had kept active during his stay in Africa, that much she was sure of. He wore a simple black t-shirt with ripped jeans and muddy sneakers, but Dawn couldn't think of a time where he looked better. She smiled up at him and shook her head.

"You don't know how happy I am to see you Xander."

He smiled his usual lopsided Xander grin and gently touched her shoulder. "Same here Dawn, you don't know how much I'm glad to be here, it's been way too long."

She reached for his hand to guide him into the apartment and closed the door, locking it behind them. Xander turned around and noticed the heavy- duty locks on the doorframe and raised his eyebrows. Dawn just shrugged.

"Let's just say you can take the girl away from the Hellmouth, but you -"

"- can't take the Hellmouth out of the girl; I know." He smirked at her as he glanced around the apartment, taking it all in. "Some place you guys got here, Giles really came through with the money from the Watcher's Council."

She nodded. "Yeah, he managed to access their secret bank accounts and everything, so we've all got some money to throw around here and there." Dawn paused and pointed down the hallway. "You know you've got a bedroom here too right?"

He looked at her surprised. "Really?"

"Yep, its right down here." She took his hand again and dragged him down the hallway to the last room on the right and pushed open the door. It was a simple room with a bed and dressers and two windows overlooking the city. "Buffy and I thought that you'd want to decorate it yourself so that's why everything is kinda bare."

Xander scratched the back of his head in awe. "You guys really didn't have to do this... I don't know what to say." Dawn just smiled. "Say you'll stay with us?"

He pulled her into another hug. "Of course."

She clapped her hands together. "Great! Now let's go grab some food and you can tell me all about your adventures in Africa!"

His eyes lit up at the prospect of food. "I'm starving!"

"Good cause I've been learning how to cook, you can be my guinea pig."

She led them back out into the hallway and into the kitchen, flipping the light on as Xander propped himself up against the counter. As she opened the refrigerator and bent over to take some of the ingredients out, Xander tilted his head and looked at her backside. As soon as he realized what he was doing though, his eyes widened and mentally slapped himself in the face. This was Dawn; not just some girl. She was Buffy's younger sister who was sweet and chaste and beautiful and grown up... He shook himself out of his rapidly degenerating thoughts and tried to think of something else. Mud, books, Spike. Anything to get his mind out of the gutter.

He cleared his throat. "So, where's Buffy on this fine evening?"

Dawn laughed as she tossed a block of Parmesan cheese on the counter. "Oh, she's out with her new boyfriend somewhere."

"Buffy's got herself a new beau huh? That's cool, good for her."

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, but he's no regular guy, I don't even know his real name. He's some supernatural version of Fabio or something." She shrugged. "I like to call him Mr. Mysterious."

A look of confusion crossed Xander's handsome features. "You don't know his name?"

Dawn paused in her efforts to make him dinner and turned towards him. "Well, people call him 'The Immortal', but that's about it." She brushed a stray piece of her light brown hair out of her eyes and shrugged again. "I met him once, he was alright I guess; he didn't talk very much, and I got the feeling that he's been around the block a few times as they say." She turned back and got a pot out and filled it with water. "But I didn't want to say anything to Buffy about it, it's her decision and it's the first relationship she's had with anyone since that whole weird thing with Spike so I figure that's something right?"

Xander considered this. Surely anyone would be better for her then Spike; whatever she had had with the bleached blonde vampire was in the past. "I guess so." He decided to change the subject. "Anything else exciting happening around here?"

Dawn placed the pot on the store and turned the dial to turn it on. "Hmm, well Andrew lives here with us now, he's out right now on a date though."

Xander's eyebrows rose. "Andrew lives here? Oh poor you." He patted Dawn's shoulder as she laughed.

"Its really not as bad as it seems, he's gotten a lot better since Sunnydale. I mean, he still begs me to play video games and Dungeons and Dragons with him on a weekly basis, but other then that he's pretty fun to hang out with." She bit her lip in thought. "I wish he would just admit to me that he's gay though, I think he'd feel a lot better about himself if he did."

Xander nodded in agreement. "Yeah, are you sure he's gay though? I mean maybe he's really not."

A smirk appeared on Dawn's face. "Well, after I had overheard him moaning the pool boy's name in his sleep, I came to my own conclusions."

A surprised, yet comical look crossed his face. "I SO don't want to know." He looked at her face and burst out laughing. "Not that I care, but what's this pool guy's name?"

She giggled as she dumped some pasta into the water and stirred it. "Antonio, he's really nice, but he hardly speaks English so I really haven't talked to him much." She set the timer on the microwave and then motioned for them to sit down in the living room. "No matter how much I try learning Italian, it just doesn't seem to stick in my head; I'm so not a language person." She sighed.

Xander plopped down next to her on the loveseat and took his muddy sneakers off. "Hey I'm not either so don't feel bad. I think the only Italian word I know is Ciao."

A smile crossed her pretty face as she curled her legs up underneath her and turned to face Xander. "Nothing else has really been happening, no monsters or anything lately, unless you count last week when Angel and Spike came here looking for Buffy."

Xander's eyes widened. "Spike?"

She slapped her hand across her mouth. "Oh my God, you didn't know - he's back, well he came back after Angel had received this mystical package thingy."

"Does Buffy know about this?"

Dawn paused. "Yeah, she found out last week after they had left and Andrew spilled the beans."

"Oh, so why were Dead Boy and Captain Peroxide here in the first place?"

She rolled her eyes. "They thought Buffy was in danger; they assumed that The Immortal was after her." She laughed for a moment. "Andrew said you should've seen their faces when he told them she was dating him."

Xander bit his lip to keep from laughing. "I can just imagine. So they flew back to LA with their tales between their legs?"

She giggled. "So to speak. Andrew said they weren't very happy about it."

"My heart goes out to them." He looked at her and thought again how much she had grown since last year. "So how have you been?"

She sighed. "Well, I got the equivalent of my GED from high school a month ago, so Buffy's been pressuring me to apply to some schools around here. I told her I wasn't ready to go right off to college, and of course that didn't go over so well with her. Not to mention the fact that she hasn't really been home lately to even try to talk to her about anything." Her shoulders sagged. "I just hope she remembers to be home on Tuesday."

Xander looked at her in sympathy. "Your birthday."

She nodded, a slight smile hanging upon her lips. "You remembered."

His hand lightly touched her knee. "How could I forget? That's why I came home a week earlier!"

Dawn looked at him in disbelief. "Really?"

"Yeah, you seem surprised though."

"Its nothing, I've just been kinda lonely. Everyone's been doing his or her own thing, and that's great, but at the same time its like I'm not allowed to do anything. Buffy doesn't realize I'm going to be eighteen in a couple of days; she still treats me like I'm twelve." She paused as she glanced at the timer on the microwave before continuing. "Like last week for example, I told her I was going to this new club downtown and she said the only way I was going was if she tagged along which wouldn't be bad except when we got there and a few guys started dancing with me she flipped out and dragged me out of there."

Xander tried to hide a smile from appearing upon his lips. "These guys weren't trying to hump your leg were they?"

A blush crept up her cheeks. "That's not the point though."

"Well, if an older sister saw a bunch of horny guys grinding against her younger sister, one would assume she would put a stop to it pretty darn fast dontcha think?"

She reluctantly nodded. "Yeah, I guess. But you know what I mean, I'm just sick of it; I'm not a little kid anymore." She waved her hand up and down her body to emphasize her statement.

Xander swallowed. Dawn definitely wasn't little anymore, that much was for sure. The last remnants of the girl she was last year was completely gone now; her slim, childlike body replaced by a curvaceous, slender one with creamy porcelain skin. His right eye wandered across her body for a brief moment, noticing how her tight t-shirt accentuated her ample chest and how he could see her flat stomach where her short shirt ended. His gaze skittered back up to her face and for a second he caught her staring back at him. He cleared his throat and motioned to the microwave.

"Ah, I think the timer just went off." He got up off of the couch and headed for the bathroom. "Gotta use the little boy's room, I'll be right back."

Dawn shook herself out of the moment and jumped up to drain the pasta. She wondered what just went on there; she noticed Xander looking at her pretty hard, and not just in a friend way. Her heart skipped a beat and for a moment she almost dropped the colander on the floor. As she put the pasta into a bowl, she took a container of tomato sauce out of the refrigerator and popped it in the microwave for a minute before taking out a plate and silverware. As she placed everything on the kitchen table, she failed to hear Xander come up behind her. She turned around to retrieve the sauce from the microwave and was greeted by his broad chest less then a foot away from her. She made a squeaking sound and braced her hand against him to steady herself.

He noticed her hand on his chest and tried vehemently to ignore the effect it was having on him as both of his hands gently grabbed her shoulders. "Sorry, I thought you heard me."

Dawn stood there looking up at him, trying her hardest not to look flustered. "Its okay, I have a knack for drowning out things, especially when Buffy and her boy toy are in her room sometimes."

"Noisy?"

She shook her head. "Understatement."

Xander suddenly realized he was still holding onto her shoulders and began to drop his hands to his sides when she turned abruptly and his fingertips lightly brushed against her breasts causing both of them to freeze. Dawn's crystal blue eyes immediately looked up at his chocolate brown one and she finally saw what she was hoping she would. It wasn't just embarrassment clouding his gorgeous features, but lust; and maybe, just maybe something more.




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