Chapter 4


As fast as she was, she still missed him. He swung sideways blindingly fast and the stake slashed through the air where his heart would have been.

“You really would have dusted me,” he said, shaking his head reprovingly. “You’d kill me before you face the truth about yourself.”

She whirled on him, the stake poised underhand the way an expert knife fighter would hold his weapon, deadly and deliberate.

“No more talk. I’m not listening to anything you have to say.”

“When do you ever? Steady on, pet,” he mocked, jumping backwards as she sliced at him again. “You might hurt something.”

“Just you.”

She had him backed against the counter now. He reached for something under it, his shoulder brushing the bottle of Jack Daniels that stood on top, so that it rocked wildly and almost toppled over. But he was trapped and his chest was right there, wide open and unprotected. She smiled coldly and lunged.

Something hit her. She felt a thud and the next thing she knew she was lying flat on her back on the floor, totally disoriented. Her muscles didn’t work; her wits were scattered. Consciousness was suspended. She didn’t even know who she was, floating somewhere in a dream state.

Time passed in slow motion. Several millennia perhaps. She was aware of being lifted with an odd sort of gentleness and moved through space, set down again on something soft. Metal was clasped on her wrists and her arms were raised above her head.

Spike’s face floated in front of her. She blinked and it came slowly back into focus.

“Wha-at...?”

“You back, pet?” He was crouched on his heels in front of her, holding a strange rod across his knees. “You should be familiar with Dru’s little toy by now.”

“C-cattle prod.” Her tongue felt thick in her mouth. The words came in a croak. “Stun gun.”

He nodded and held the rod up so that she could see the operating end of it. It had two short flat metal prongs about two inches apart. He pressed a switch at the other end and an electric spark leaped between the prongs, fat, bright blue, and crackling.

“Dru gave you five thousand volts for three seconds. That knocked you cold for twelve minutes. I gave you two thousand for one. Figured that was good enough and it was. Didn’t quite knock you out, but made you malleable. Want some water?”

He tossed the rod aside and held a glass to her mouth. Ice water. She gulped it greedily. Her wits started to pull themselves together again.

He withdrew the glass as she turned her head to look around. She was sitting on the floor on a cushion, her arms above her head. She tried to draw them down and couldn’t. Looking up, she saw that her wrists were handcuffed to a chain that went around a stone pillar.

“What do you think you’re doing? Let me go!”

Her legs were free. She raised them to kick at him, but he had already risen and was out of reach, moving to set the glass on the counter.

“Want to talk to you.”

“Oh, like the last time?” she sneered. “Chain me up until I give you a crumb, tell you I feel something for you? It didn’t work that time and it won’t work now.”

“Don’t give a fuck about crumbs or what you feel. Told you. I’m not in love with you any more.”

“Then what the hell is this all about?”

He brought a kitchen chair around and set it in front of her just out of reach of her feet, then swung a leg across to sit straddling it backwards, his arms crossed upon its high back.

“Got something to say.”

She glared at him. “I’m not going to listen to anything you have to say!”

“That’s always been your problem, pet. You never listen.”

“Not when I’m chained up like this! Unlock these handcuffs!”

“Not till I’m done. I know you, Slayer. Bloody spoiled-rotten little brat. You’ll try to kill me or have a tantrum or run out of here or even just sit there with your hands over your ears. You just won’t listen. Always have to mouth off instead.”

“If you think I’ll...”

“Aah, shaddup, pet. God, I get tired of listening to you throw your weight around. The bunch of you strutting around like little tin gods and never taking responsibility for your actions. Never ever thinking about consequences. You make me sick.”

“I’m not going to listen to your insults!”

“Oh, yes, you are. It’s time someone told you a few truths about yourself. Gonna get a few things off my chest and you’re gonna listen and not say a word. Or I’ll gag you. Slap some tape over your mouth. Don’t think I won’t.” He nodded to where a roll of duct tape lay on the counter. “Want me to do that?”

She glared at him inimically.

“Thought not.” He settled himself comfortably on the chair. “Right then. Let’s start with the Watcher. At least he’s got some excuse, indoctrinated as he is by his Council. Can’t think outside the box. That’s excusable. What’s not is that the minute things get really tough, he cuts and runs. Leaves you all in the lurch.”

Buffy bit her lip. It was what she had felt when Giles left, but hadn’t admitted to herself.

“Picks his moments, doesn’t he, with you just resurrected and going into meltdown ’cause you can’t handle being alive again, and Red powertripping ’cause he never taught her or got someone to teach her how to handle her magic the way he should have. He knows both these things. I heard him talking to Willow, talking to you, bloody hell, you sang it at him, Slayer. It’s not like he didn’t know. But does he try to fix it? No. He skedaddles back to England so he won’t have to deal with it.”

After a moment, Buffy muttered, “He said I had to learn to stand on my own feet...”

“Sure, but the time to take away the crutches is not when the patient has two broken legs.” He let that sink in for a moment. “Willow. Bird with a massive inferiority complex suddenly finds she’s got power coming out the wazoo. Uses it to make everybody do what she says. Doesn’t care what anybody else wants. Walks into their heads without asking, changes their memories without their permission. Kind of a rape, if you ask me. Uses that mind-rape magic even on Tara who loves her and who has already been damaged that way by Glory. God knows how Tara felt having Willow do that to her as well.”

“Horrible,” whispered Buffy. “That’s why Tara walked out.”

“Yeah. Red finally got her arse kicked. Then Rack did to her what she was doing to everybody else, so now maybe she knows what it feels like. Might shape up. Unlike Harris.”

“Oh, everyone knows your opinion of Xander,” she said bitterly. “Let’s just take it as a given.”

“He’s a beaut, in’ he? A big pile of nothing and he knows it. Lives to put everyone down with that motormouth of his so that he can seem better than they are. Bullies those who can’t fight back. Hides behind your skirts when they can. No cojones. No balls at all. But he’s got a soul, hasn’t he? That’s why he’s such a determined demon hater, so bigoted. Only thing he’s got, that soul that lets him tell himself he’s better than a whole class of beings. Even stomps on Anya all the time, ’cause she used to be a demon and doesn’t have the social smarts not to say exactly what she thinks. Tell you, Slayer, the things Anya says might embarrass you, but at least they’re honest and forthright, unlike the bile that wanker spews.”

Buffy looked away. “You’ve always hated him.”

“I despise him, Slayer. He’s not worth hating. I’ve come to the end of my rope with him. You tell him to stay away from me or my mates will make his life a living hell.”

“The Firoud.”

“He gives me grief, they give him grief. He doesn’t, they won’t. Simple as that.”

“I thought you prided yourself on fighting your own battles.”

“I would if I didn’t have this chip in my head. There wouldn’t be anything left of him then, not even an oily spot on the ground. If I could catch him of course. He’s got a yellow streak a mile wide and he’d be sniveling like a whipped puppy behind your skirts if my chip were out. But your erstwhile buddies of the Initiative have made that impossible. And you were wrong about them too, weren’t you, Slayer? You’ve got some record, judgment wise, haven’t you?”

Her lips tightened and she scowled at him. “Are you done?”

“Not half. Now we come to the fun part. You.”

“A demon’s opinion of the Slayer.” She sighed dramatically. “Like that will be something new.”

“You’re a coward.”

She caught her breath in outrage.

“Oh, not about the fighting part. You’re always a bloody good fighter. But about everything else. Any of your good buddies even frowns at you and you fold like limp spaghetti. You make wet kleenex look like granite. Everybody’s opinion before your own, right, Summers?”

“I happen to agree with them!”

“Yeah, sure. Take this resurrection business. The bunch of them pull you out of Heaven without even bothering to check where you were. Bloody stupid thing to do. I’d have kicked their arses for it. Why didn’t you? Didn’t want to hurt their poor little feelings? Shyeah.”

“They meant it for the best!”

“Sure. But you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t resent it. That’s only natural. Shoulda yelled at them, whacked them upside the head, got it out of your system. Woulda done all of you a power of good. ’Cause once you’d done that, it would all have been over, in the past. You’d feel better, they’d feel better. But no, you go into martyr mode to make them feel guilty instead.”

“That’s not why...!”

“Oh, right, you got depressed. Poor little you. Pulled out of Heaven like that. Having whatever Powers exist think you’re more useful here being their Champion. You’ve been cheated. You’ve got to go on living. Like the rest of the human race.”

“You don’t understand!”

“So sad that you’ve got to do your four score and ten before you can finally be gathered to your fathers. Really unfair that you have to be like everyone else. But while everyone else just hopes there’s a Heaven, you know there’s one. And, unlike everyone else, you know now you’ll end up there.” He gave her a twisted smile. “There’s a lot of us who won’t. But you only have to wait a while. Just like the rest of humanity.”

“That’s not fair!”

“Yeah, you don’t feel anything. Depression. Possibly clinical depression. See a shrink, Slayer. Not the usual ones who don’t know resurrections can happen. But somewhere among the Wiccas that your Watcher has access to has to be a witch that can help. Find her. But you’d rather whine than do something constructive.”

She looked at him with hatred. “You really are a monster.”

“And you’re afraid you are. Because you can’t feel anything real. Because you’re dead inside. Isn’t that right, Slayer? You call me a monster, but the truth is that you’re afraid you’ve become one. I’m the only one who can make you feel and that scares you because of the implications. You know why you really hate me? Because I haven’t killed you yet.”

She flinched.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “You want to die. You’ve got there at last. Like the others. You’ve finally got that death wish. Now you know what it’s like to die and where it leads you. And you want it. That peace. I’ll give it to you, pet, if you ask it. Ask, and I’ll have myself that real good day.”

“No,” she whispered. “No.”

“Ask and I’ll make you feel. Ask and I’ll make you die. I’ll give you whatever you want. Haven’t I always given you what you want?”

She shook her head dumbly, trying to reject everything that he was saying.

“Sorting through the memories, I finally figured out why I fell for you. Because you were the best and I have a fatal attraction to the best. The brightest and the bravest. And that’s what you were, Slayer. But you’re not anymore, are you? You’re a bleeding disappointment, pet. Sure don’t love the whiner you’ve turned into.”

He rose and came to stand over her, looking down at her scornfully.

“Everyone’s been pussyfooting around you. Too gutless or too guilty to tell you the truth. Thought someone should. You really needed a slap upside the head.”

He unlocked her right wrist, then tossed the key into her lap.

“Time for the funeral service? That’s a pun, in case you didn’t get it.” He grinned at her, then turned and went to the counter for the drink he had laid aside. “Up to you now, what kind of service you prefer.”

She was shaking with fury, almost unable to unlock her left hand. She succeeded at last, ripped the handcuff off and shot to her feet.

“I should kill you!”

Laughing, he ducked the key she flung at him. “Wanna dance? I love dancing with you. You like it too. Both ways. Like us fucking. Like me beating you up. Even pain feels good, doesn’t it? I’m not the one in love with pain, pet. You are. It’ll be a pleasure giving you that, payback for all the times you’ve kicked me around since I got this chip. It’ll be a pleasure either way. Happy to service you, pet, whichever way you want it.”

She was too enraged right now to have felt pain. She had gone beyond that, was in this white-hot blaze of rage and humiliation, just wanting him to not exist, to silence him, wipe him and his mockery right off the face of the earth.

But she could see that was just what he expected her to try. He had some other trick up his sleeve, not just that cattle prod. No, it was simpler than that: he knew she wouldn’t fight well when she was this angry, knew he would easily get the upper hand and was looking forward to kicking her ass. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

She gathered the tattered rags of her dignity around her, spun on her heel and stalked out. She could hear him laughing behind her. It was a retreat and they both knew it. She ground her teeth together viciously.

She went home to Revello Drive, hoping that the others would all still be at the Magic Box. But they were at her house. It was too painful for Willow to be at the Magic Box long, with all its tempting paraphernalia around her, so they had all come here to wait.

Xander leaped eagerly to his feet when she walked in. “Did you dust him?”

“No.”

His face fell. “But...”

“I missed him,” she lied. “Maybe tomorrow.”

The girls all looked relieved, especially Dawn. Xander was furious.

“But tonight! Those Firoud!”

“They won’t bother you if you don’t bother Spike.”

“You mean you’re going to let him get away with it? Buffy!”

She was suddenly sick to death of all the yelling and the reproaches, just wanted to be alone for once without all of them clinging and yammering at her. She had been lectured enough for one night.

“Oh, shut up! You’ve been asking for it, Xander. If you can’t take it, then don’t dish it out!”

Xander swelled with affront, but Anya grabbed his arm, for once sensitive to someone else’s mood.

“We should be going. It’s late.” She tugged at Xander’s arm. “Come on, Xander. Buffy’s right. Spike said the Firoud wouldn’t hassle you if you didn’t hassle Spike.”

“But...”

Anya pulled him, still protesting, out of the door. Willow had already retreated precipitously up the stairs to her bedroom, in her fragile state not wanting to be anywhere near an angry Buffy.

“I-I’d better go too,” said Tara, heading awkwardly towards the front door.

Dawn hurriedly got in the way. “I thought you’d be staying with us again, Tara.”

“Not yet.”

“But Willow’s better! She’s not going to use magic. She promised. Please stay, Tara.”

“No.” said Tara sadly, but with determination. “The last time she promised to give up magic, she lasted only two days. All I asked for then was that she give it up for a week and she tried to magic me into forgetting I asked. This time she has to prove that she really means it.”

“You don’t have to be so hard! It’s mean! That’s not like you!”

“You don’t understand, Dawn. One can’t just keep forgiving someone over and over again. They never learn that way. Too much forgiveness can be as bad as too little. You’ve seen where it’s led to with Willow. Tough love’s sometimes the only way to help.”

“Willow has to learn that her actions have consequences,” said Buffy quietly when Dawn still looked rebellious. “I’ll walk you home, Tara.”

“Oh, there’s no need, Buffy,” said Tara, surprised. “Really.”

“There’s a need. Back in a few, Dawn, okay?”

Dawn nodded sulkily.

“I-is there some new demon around?” asked Tara curiously as she and Buffy walked down the street.

“No, just the same old one. Spike.” Buffy glanced uncomfortably at Tara’s confused face. “He can hurt me. Without his head exploding.”

“Oh, my God! His chip’s stopped working!”

“No, it still works. Just not on me. I-I need to know about the spell. The one that...brought me back. I’d ask Willow, but...”

Tara’s eyes widened. “You think it’s you!”

“I...He...” Buffy bit her lip painfully hard. “I think...maybe I came back wrong.”

“No, Buffy, th-that’s not...No. You didn’t,” said Tara firmly.

“Can you check out the spell? Just to see if there’s something that...Could you just check? Please?”

“I will,” Tara promised.

The worst thing was that a lot of what Spike said was true, Buffy thought, lying in bed that night, staring at the ceiling. He had meant to hurt, but there was an element of truth in the things he said, however much she tried to deny it. She hated him for saying it, but he did see things, had always seen things clearly while she and all the Scoobies except for Tara spent so much time on the Nile.

She had never gone in for self-analysis, always flinched away from digging up and facing her own hidden motives and emotions—which were of course hidden precisely because she didn’t want to face them. They all did that, all the Scoobies, even Dawn. Only Anya and Tara didn’t—Anya because she didn’t hide anything at all, upfront and forthright as Spike had said; Tara because she was clear-eyed and honest. The rest of them, they avoided looking at those shameful things, those discreditable impulses that everyone had. Buffy especially didn’t want to face hers. Until Spike flung them into her face, meaning to cut her up.

“I hate him,” she muttered. “I hate him.”

And she should. He was a demon, without a soul, evil. Everything she was fighting against. Everything it was her duty to fight.

Yet he was the only thing that made her feel anything. Ever since Willow had brought her back, she had been going through the motions. Nothing seemed to mean anything. Nothing penetrated her heart. Nothing seemed real. Not her life, not her friends, not even Dawn, her own sister. And Spike mocked her for it. She hated him for that.

But hate was a feeling. Anger was a feeling. Lust. ‘I just want to feel,’ she had sung to him. After he had told her to let him rest in peace.

But he didn’t want to be left alone now, did he? He knew that he had the upper hand, that he got to her. He was using her. So why shouldn’t she use him back?

That was wrong. That wasn’t the way she should be thinking. It had to be something in Willow’s resurrection spell. This wasn’t her. She had to have come back wrong. She clung to that, because that way it wasn’t her fault, and that way maybe it was something that could be fixed.

The next few days were tense. Dawn was being pissy. Willow was finding it hard not to use magic, since even searching the internet was proving to be a temptation when a snap of the fingers could bring up needed information a hundred times faster. Xander was sulking resentfully. No Firoud had disturbed his nights, but he was angry that Buffy had seemed to take Spike’s side when she had snapped at him like that. Tara was nowhere to be seen and Buffy had to keep herself by sheer force of will from banging on her door and shouting at her to hurry.

The next night she opened her front door to go on patrol and nearly bumped into Tara who was raising her hand to knock. Buffy grabbed her arm, then glanced over her shoulder at Willow and Dawn going into the kitchen.

“There’s a bench down the street where we can talk,” she said rapidly under her breath and Tara nodded.

“I’ve double checked everything,” said Tara when they reached the bench.

“And?”

Tara smiled widely. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Buffy!”

Buffy caught her breath. “Then why can Spike hurt me?”

“Well, you are a tiny bit different. Shifting you out of...from where you were, funneling your essence back into your body...it altered you on a basic molecular level. Probably just enough to confuse the sensors or whatever in Spike’s chip. But it’s all just surfacey physical stuff. It wouldn’t have any more effect than a...a bad sunburn.”

“I didn’t come back wrong?”

“No, you’re the same Buffy.” Tara laughed a little. “With a deep tropical cellular tan.”

Couldn’t blame it on anything physical. Buffy stared bleakly into space. Could only blame it on herself. The way she had let herself become, the things Spike mocked her for. Her own appetites, urges.

Why not use him? she thought after Tara had gone and she was walking through Restfield on her patrol. She glared resentfully at Spike’s crypt. She needed to feel, needed sensations to bring her back into the world. He could provide her with sensations. He could be useful for something.

She just had to be careful not to get emotionally involved. That was a no-no with a creature like Spike. But there was little chance of that when she couldn’t get emotional about anything. And even he himself admitted now what she had always known, that he didn’t love her. So even that tiny flicker of guilt was removed. She would be hurting no one, not even him.

The crypt door opened abruptly.

“Come in or haul ass, Slayer,” said Spike, amused. He wasn’t wearing his duster or his Docs. His feet were bare and the black shirt that hung open over his low-slung jeans revealed that sensational torso. “Make up your mind. Don’t just stand there with your thumb up your arse. The suspense is giving me a hard on.”

She snarled. “God, you know just how to sweet talk a girl, don’t you?”

“What do pretty words have to do with you or me? We’re way beyond that now. We’re down into the primal stuff. The part that’s all raw animal. The part that’s not brains, but blood.”

He laughed at the spasm of distasteful rejection in her face.

“That’s where you’re at, pet. Down to basics. Down to the base, brutal, reptilian depths of your brain. Got to get that sorted before anything else can happen. Otherwise you’re building your house on sand. Come on in and let’s discuss it.”

She hesitated and he shrugged.

“Or stay there and we’ll talk it out where anyone can hear.”

“Or I could just dust you!”

“We both know you won’t, pet. Not when I’m the only thing that can reach that side of you.”

She considered stalking off in high dudgeon, then felt foolish as he watched her calmly, smiling a little. After a moment, she shrugged and walked in. He closed the door behind her and dropped the bar into place.

“I told you about that once, about blood screaming inside you to work its will. But you didn’t understand then. You were still young, still full of light. You’ve seen the darkness now, looked it right in the face.”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“There’s darkness in everyone, pet. That primeval, elemental thing that lies beneath. And until you understand that, accept it, you won’t ever be able to control it or rise above it. There’s a demon in you all right. It’s called the Slayer. That’s where your power comes from. That’s the heart of it. The driving force. That only another demon can match.”

“Is that why you think I need you?” she sneered.

“Don’t you? Only a demon can reach it. Only a demon would want to. All the rest of them, your good buddies, they’d run, wouldn’t they, if they saw it.”

“Angel...”

“He’d run fastest. He’s terrified of that side of himself, so much so that he denies it’s even him. He’s not Angelus, oh, no. He’s Angel. He’s a prime example of how denying it doesn’t work. Haven’t you seen that in the way he acts, the things he does?”

She bit her lip. Even she had to admit that a lot of Angel’s actions were questionable.

“He keeps screwing up because he doesn’t want to even think of his dark side, let alone accept it. He doesn’t want to think of you having one either. He wants you to be perfect. But there’s no such thing as perfection outside of Heaven. You should know that.”

She wasn’t perfect, didn’t even want to be. That was too scary a concept. That wasn’t real, wasn’t human. But:

“You just want me to give in to that dark side,” she flung at him.

“I don’t care what you do. I’m just telling it the way it is. It’s not going to break my heart if you walk out that door. You’re the one who’d lose by it and you know that. Otherwise why aren’t you fucking some guy off the street? You’d have plenty of takers, bint like you. But you know I’m the only one who can give you what you need.”

“I’d just be using you to make myself feel,” she said disdainfully. “Like some dildo or vibrator.”

“Why should that bother me? How many times have you told me I’m just a thing? Well, I’d just be using you for sex. So we’d be even. You’re just a thing to me as well, Slayer. A blowup doll. The Bot.”

Her eyes widened and he laughed scornfully.

“Don’t like the term when it’s applied to you. You can’t be a thing. You’re the Slayer, right? Sod that.”

“I shouldn’t have come here,” she muttered and turned to the door. “I should have known better.”

His hands slammed against the door on either side of her, keeping it shut. She spun to face him.

“And leave without what you came for?” he mocked.

“I thought you said you didn’t care if I walked out.”

“I don’t ‘care’. I just want to fuck you. You’re the best ride I’ve had in my unlife and I want more.” He grinned tightly and leaned upon her, the full length of his body against the full length of hers. “And you want it too.”

She did. Her whole body shuddered and clenched under his weight, the feel of him against her, the tempting cave of his open mouth only a breath away from hers. That promise of overwhelming sensation.

She opened her mouth to deny all of that and he took it with his.

God, the man could kiss! She was lost in a second, unable to push him away, drowning in feeling, in the thrust and slide of his tongue against hers, his body moving and pressing upon her, his hands kneading her flesh.

It was that way he had of submerging himself in the moment, where nothing else existed, past and future both thrust away, no other thought in his head but the present and this one bright instant of voluptuous delight. That was what made him such a fabulous lover. That concentrated focus where nothing existed except themselves and this intense sensation.

It was what she wanted, what she needed. ‘Make me feel.’ And he could; he did.

She didn’t have to think, didn’t have to care, not about anything. Not herself, not him. Just had to feel. It was liberating.

Her hands closed on the hanging edges of his shirt, pulled it off him. She felt the growl of pleasure and satisfaction vibrate through him. He shoved her leather jacket off her shoulders, caught at the curving neck of her tank top beneath, fingers going straight down into the front of her bra. He yanked and both tank and bra ripped away.

All violence. Hands tearing each other’s clothing off, mouths devouring each other’s flesh, bodies thrusting and straining against each other. And God! she was alive, alive, pleasure inundating her, wildfire burning across her every nerve, electrifying, inflaming. His hands tangled in her hair, dragged at it, arching her backwards for his mouth to close upon her breast, suck it in strong pulls that went right down to her core. Her back bowed, pushing her breast into his mouth, her whole body flaring into white heat.

They were heading towards the floor, both stark naked now.

“Not again,” she muttered. “My ass still hurts from all that rubble we were lying on before.”

“Your ass?” he retorted, aggrieved. “You were the one on top, pet. The ass on the planks was mine. After that, I made sure you had a cushion under you.”

They looked at each other for a moment of shared, helpless laughter. Unwilling connection.

“You’ve got a bed,” she remembered.

“Good thought. Hope we make it.”

They staggered sideways towards the open trapdoor, still tangled together and falling over each other’s feet, toppled into it. He landed on his feet like a cat, caught her with a jolt at the last second, then spun and tossed her onto the bed. The next moment, he was over her, braced on his elbows on either side of her head, his weight heavy upon her.

“Made it.”

“Handy,” she muttered, yanking him down harder upon her, her nails clawing his back.

He purred. They were both so aroused by now that the slight sting was only stimulation. His eyes went suddenly gold and the quiver of the nerves that she as a Slayer always felt when a vamp was near abruptly intensified.

“Hey!”

He hadn’t done that the last time, had stayed looking human with his vamp side revealed only in the strength and power that matched hers.

“You’ll like it.”

His head came down and his tongue rasped over her nipple. She caught her breath. That tongue had gone sandpapery, like a cat’s, and the sensation was incredible.

“There are advantages to having a vamp do you, Slayer,” he purred.

“Seems like,” she panted. That tongue was rasping over every inch of her skin, breast and belly and thighs, and her whole body was arching and writhing helplessly. “Come on, damn you, come on!”

“No.”

“Ohh...!”

Fangs had joined the golden eyes and raspy tongue, pricking and biting all over her, an unbearable stimulation at this point. She could see the triumph and the mockery in his eyes. He knew he was driving her insane.

“How’s that sensation thing coming along? Feel that, do you? Like it? Only a vamp can give you that feeling, Slayer.”

Her brain was blanking out into white fire and galvanic sparks. Exquisite torture. She couldn’t take any more, snarled and tried to roll him over and take control.

His hands caught her wrists and pinned them to the bed. His strength matched hers and at that angle, with him between her legs like that, she could not budge him.

“Not this time, pet. This time I call the shots.”

“Well, get on with it, damn you!”

His eyes danced. “You asking?”

She could feel how impossibly hard he was, rubbed herself deliberately against him and heard him catch his breath harshly.

“Guess you are.” He laughed, then came into her with one hard thrust.

Her throat arched back helplessly. He stretched her to her limit. She would never get used to the way he filled her, made her feel complete. Him. A vamp. But, oh, God, it felt wonderful!

Then he stopped. Balls deep within her, he stopped.

“What?” she gasped. “What’s wrong? Move, damn you!”

“Let’s have it in words, Slayer.”

She caught her breath. “You...you...!”

She hit his shoulders with her fists and he laughed, deep in his throat.

“Not gonna have you fool yourself into thinking you’re the helpless victim of my base desires. Not this time. Ask, Slayer.”

She clenched upon his thickness within her and saw his eyes close with pleasure, felt his breath shudder against her face.

“God, those Slayer muscles! They’re something else,” he muttered. But then he withdrew almost completely. “But still in control here, pet. I can pull out and leave you hanging. Ask.”

Asshole.

“Oh, shut up and fuck me, you bastard!”

He gave a snarling laugh. “Good enough. So long as you admit it, Summers.”

She cried out as he powered into her. Lost herself in sensation, in the driving rhythm of his body thrusting her higher and higher. Lost control and clawed and bit and panted. In flashes of sight as her eyelids shuddered closed and open again, she saw him lose himself too, eyes going blind, head flung back, heard the gasp of his breath, the little grunt of effort on every powerful stroke.

All ferocious, feral, violent passion. Exquisite, unendurable feeling, desperately desired.

Then his head came down and she saw something glimmer in his eyes. Purpose and mockery.

“What?”

He bit her. With shock, she felt his fangs slide into her neck, tried to shove him away.

“No! How dare you!”

She felt the breath of his laughter around the fangs in her neck. Then the draw started.

“Oh, God!”

Unbearable ecstasy thrilling through every nerve in her body, singing through every vein. A wondrous, unbelievable sensation. He had driven her so high already with his body. This took her to a whole new plane, his cock thrusting her higher and higher, his fangs forcing that glorious, indescribable rapture upon her.

“Spike!”

Her brain splintered and blanked right out.



TBC