---

---

part thirteen - progress

---

Utter, all encompassing terror was a very quick way to forgive someone who has wronged you, and Spike had had at least four days to stew on it.

His vision blurred as he gazed again at the telling red words he had once more projected onto the wall, then down at Buffy who—thankfully— lay lightly bruised, but not bleeding (anymore), sleeping quietly on her bed. Swallowing hard, he glanced back at the words, and for a minute it seemed like the entire room shook – then he looked down and realized that he was actually shaking hard enough to blow up a can of Coke. Giving a belated gasp, he dropped the signet ring onto the floor like he’d been burned.

It had finally sunk in.

This had been his routine for four days. Ever since he'd discovered the words hidden within the jewel that could only be seen by a reflection of light, Spike had taken it out at every opportunity to study it. He'd presented it to Giles and demonstrated it. He'd allowed Willow to hold it and attempt to locate information on it. They'd tried their damned best to reassure themselves that it was just another hoax -- like half of the idiot fledglings in the graveyards that got themselves turned so they could be another Dracula, Louis, or Lestat.

Looking at it now -- gazing at the words and then looking at the ring this time -- it rang clear in Spike's mind.

She was... real.

He’d thought she was a myth. Another story Angelus had made up to try to warn off young William’s catastrophic behaviour as a fledgling. Spike wasn’t quite sure why he’d thought she was a story, considering everything that went on around Sunnydale. But somehow, in his mind, Spike had denounced her supposed legends and myths to just that – nothing more than stories. Tall tales that the old ones told their Childer so they wouldn’t be forgotten.

His mind was officially boggled.

The mother of the vampire race was here. In Sunnydale. And, oddly enough, coming on to him, while beating Buffy to within an inch of her life.

Spike sighed. Fucking figured. It couldn’t ever be something simple, could it? They couldn't ever go up against something easily beatable, like terrorists, or corrupt, slightly insane politicians, no, they had to try and go against someone who was all but fucking immortal! Weren’t the regular Big Bads enough, what with old Bat Face, the glorified stripper and UberEvil!Willow wreaking havoc? Now the creator, the literal mother of all vampires, of all demons, had to come to town.

Fan-fucking-tastic.

---

She was the first Woman that the Bible refused to write about. She’d been created to be an equal to the first Man in every way, shape and form. Lilith had not existed, and then suddenly, one day, she had, breathing her first breath of air as a fully-grown adult female, sprung from the dust of the ground like her counterpart.

The Father had intended for her to be her husband’s lesser – Lilith did not like that. She sneered at the idea, preferring to live amongst the animals and demons of the world, rather than be subject to her husband’s stupidity, and The Father’s subjectivity. She laughed when, from afar, she watched Him pull a bone from her husband’s ribs and throw it to the ground to mingle with the dust, before the other – her replacement, her sister – sprang up from the sod.

Eve was everything Lilith was not, in that she deferred all she thought to their husband. Lilith watched as the Father blinded them to all things but living in bliss in the Garden; watched in disgust and horror as her sister was willingly made the lesser in her relationship with The Father’s fool.

Lilith herself took up a life of her own, luxuriating in a world without the strictness of The Father’s rules, and the idiocy of her husband’s desires. Outside of Eden, Lilith was free -- to do whatever she wanted with her world.

The demons of her realm realized that she was the first created of The Father’s Chosen, and bowed down before her, honoring her as if she were a God. They brought her food and sacrifices and they lusted after her because she was a very beautiful woman, despite being made in The Creator’s image. They were demons – not blind.

Lilith knew of their lust for her, and used it to her advantage. Knowing that her sister and the idiot were still living in Eden, blind to their own bodies and each other, Lilith followed their example – she walked about in the nude, pretending that she wasn’t aware of how she affected the beasts of her realm. As it was, she had managed to attract the attention of two particular demons – the Prince of Lies himself, Lucifer, whose partner she would be, and the creature whose children she would bear, the Turok-han.

Lucifer could shape shift, and regularly appeared to her as a dark, handsome man with hair the color of soot and eyes of the bluest blue. He repeatedly offered her a place beside him on his demonic throne, but she continuously refused – she liked the world that The Father had created, and there was more opportunity to provide mischief when on Earth than below in Hell. Relenting to her logic – because as beautiful as she was, she was also very intelligent; probably more intelligent than The Creator had intended for her to be – Lucifer stopped offering her his throne, and instead offered her one of her own, on Earth and in command of all of the demons. He allowed her to accept the advances of the Turok-han, and offered her eternal life in the exchange that she allowed herself to breed for him. Her children would be numerous, and would populate the Earth that the Creator seemed so intent on keeping empty, save for the two oblivious ones in Eden.

She was tired of her sister not thinking for herself and allowing the bumbling idiot his own way no matter the consequences – which, since they lived in Paradise, were actually quite few and far between, if not completely nonexistent. So she accepted Lucifer’s offer on the condition that he would free her sister from Adam’s clutches.

It didn’t quite go as she had hoped it would. Lucifer had gone about it all as she’d wanted – he had appeared to Eve as a snake, having possessed the four-legged reptile; he had encouraged her to take an apple from the Tree of Knowledge that The Father had been so determined to keep His creations away from. Eve's natural curiosity prevailed, and she had accepted, and Lilith had hoped that with a bite of the apple would come the knowledge that she was being oppressed and used as nothing more than a mindless companion when she could be so much more. But Lilith's imprudent sister had delighted at the taste of the apple, and had been so conditioned that everything that was hers was also the Fool’s, that as soon as he found her and saw what she had done, she offered him a taste of the apple as well. Eve's own sin committed in naivety and despite Lilith's best intentions, had resulted in Eve's husband knowingly committing the same sin.

As punishment, they had been exiled from Eden together. The serpent whom Lucifer had possessed had his legs removed, and was forced to slither on his belly to reach his destinations.

And to Lilith’s horror, after their expulsion, her sister stayed with the fool -- going so far as to bear his first child.

What vicious, disgusting, vile offspring as well. Lilith, to her horror, bore sole witness to her nephew Abel's murder, committed by the jealous Cain. Stricken and disgusted that the Father had allowed such a foul urchin to live despite what he'd done, Lilith took it upon herself to dole out punishment. She commanded the Turok-han, her mate, to dispose of the brat.

For her, it was the beginning of the end.

---

Her head was wet.

No. Not wet. Damp. And... rough? Why rough?

Oh, God. Someone was trying to kill her. Again.

She gasped and squirmed, letting out a cry as she began struggling, trying to fight off whoever was trying to smother her.

"Shh, sweetheart. 'S alright. Buffy, 's just me."

Her eyes snapped open instantly and met worried blue. She heaved a great sigh of relief and grasped the hand that was cupping her cheek.

"Oh!" she gasped, reaching up to throw her arms around his neck. "Oh, God, Spike, you're here!"

She sensed rather than felt his hesitation, before he gave in and wrapped his arms around her. But she definitely felt him chuckle before she saw his smile. "Where else would I be, pet? Told you I wouldn't leave you, didn't I?"

Buffy closed her eyes, relishing the feeling of his arms around her - something she'd been certain she would never feel again. Granted, she'd imagined more than just his arms around her, but if she was looking to be forgiven for her past misdeeds, then she needed to be less of a horny bitch, and more of an actual person-with-a-brain.

"I don't know... I guess I thought that I imagined the past few nights..." She frowned, and then winced when pain shot across her brow. "Not that I remember much." Peering up at Spike, she clutched at his arm tightly. "Did... Did I get hurt?"

Her heart sank as soon as he sucked his lower lip in and drew a short breath.

He sighed. "Yeah, sweetheart. You got hurt real bad." He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "An' you were right... 'Bout Lira -- er, Lilith, I mean." He sighed again. "She's the one who did this to you."

The fact was, Spike thought guiltily, that following his discovery of the message in the ring, Buffy had suddenly been thrust into a bout with fever. He'd done his best to sooth her while discussing the situation with Rupert, and now, days later, the fever had broken. Buffy's forehead and face was still a little warm, but not alarmingly so. And even better than that, all of her wounds had healed. All that remained of the attack on her by Lilith was a pukish-yellow colored bruising along her left cheekbone, her left collarbone, and the right side of her ribs. All in all, she was healed -- perhaps not quite mentally yet, but certainly physically.

The memory began filtering through Buffy's mind, and an exhausted moan escaped her lips. She didn't even bother to take the effort for her well deserved 'I told you so' lashing. "She was so strong," Buffy whispered. "I hit her with everything I had, and she just wouldn't go down... She was like a brick wall or something; Spike, it was like I was fighting Glory all over again, except this time, she was twice as strong -- nothing affected her!"

When Buffy looked up at him again, Spike's lips were pursed tightly together. Concerned, she tugged gently on his arm. "Spike? What is it?"

He opened his mouth to say something, then seemed to think better of it. Inhaling deeply, he hoisted himself upright onto the bed, stretching out lengthwise before tentatively wrapping an arm around her. Quietly breathing a sigh of relief when she leaned into him unquestioningly, he said, "Sweetheart, you, uh... you remember the ring she tossed at you? The one you gave me?"

Buffy nodded, her eyes showing her wariness and confusion, then her disgust at her recollection of the ring. "Yeah. It was gold and ugly, and could've used more diamonds instead of just that big old honking ruby in the middle."

Spike snorted with mirth, hugging her close. Typical Buffy -- more focused on the appearance of the ring than what it might actually mean. It brought a breath of fresh air to the frustration and worry of the last few days. Shaking his head, he continued. "I didn't understand why she gave it to you if she was tryin' ta keep herself a secret." His eyes lowered suddenly, miserably. "I get it now. She doesn't care. She wants us to know what... who... she is." He reached into his pocket and retrieved the small but heavy ring, holding it between Buffy and himself.

Buffy curled herself in towards him, a chill rushing down her back as she glanced at his drawn features, then down at the ring. "W-Who is she?"

Spike remained silent for a moment before raising his head and capturing her gaze with his own. "She's the beginning." At Buffy's dumbfounded look, he sighed. "Gather close, kitten. Got a bit of a story to tell you."

~

Lilith's spirit abandoned her, just as Lilith abandoned Eve. Her sister was a fool, who bore ignorant fools and was mated to the biggest fool, the King of fools himself.

When Lilith turned her back, she shed the last mantle of her humanity. After Adam and Eve cast Cain from the tribe for his crime against Abel, Lilith had called on her mate to exact her vengeance.

Of course, she'd forgotten about the warning mark on Cain's forehead that the Creator had placed there. It didn't matter in the end -- the Turok showed no mercy. Not to Cain... Not to his wife... Not to his children.

It should have pained her to see the destruction of her sister's eldest. But Eve and Adam had allowed the murderer to live while denying their youngest his right to be avenged. Abel had been a paragon of virtue: a good, kind, innocent boy who loved his family and the Lord dearly... and in a moment of jealousy, Cain had struck him down, had dealt his own brother the deathblow without a single backwards glance.

The wife and children, no doubt, would have followed the cretin.

---

"Okay," Buffy said, drawing the word out in her confusion. "I'm not a big Bible reader, Spike, you know that, but I do remember some stuff. Basically you're telling me that Lilith was the real first woman, but she didn't want to be the Mary Sue type, the sort of perfect woman that has no flaws and does whatever her hubby tells her to do, so she dropped him and started hanging out with demons instead. She screwed the Devil and that icky Turk-whatsit -- major ew, by the way. She looked at Eve like her sister and took offense that one of Eve's kids killed the other one. So you're saying that Cain was actually killed by this Uber!Vamp thingy on Lilith's orders after he killed his own brother? Because he killed his own brother?"

"'xactly, princess," he agreed, nodding.

Buffy settled back against her pillows in confusion. "But she's evil," she protested. "She obviously doesn't feel a hint of humanity or compassion, otherwise she never would have done this to me, right? How can she be so cruel now when it was obvious that her issues with Cain made her all uppity and self-righteous and stuff?"

Spike sighed. "Buffy, sweetheart, she's been alive for the most part, for over six millennia. Nobody is sure exactly how old she is, but she's really soddin' old." His eyes saddened as he looked at her. "Humanity can only carry you through so much before you abandon it completely. Sometimes 's just easier not to feel."

She was obviously still confused. Spike closed his eyes, then drew a deep breath and opened them. "Let me finish explainin'."

---

The Lord had not been pleased with Lilith’s coercion of her mate. There was no way to hide from him. Lilith instead had to settle for keeping a low profile, along with her mate and her clan. She'd made one move - a strike of vengeance for a senseless death that He had not seen fit to punish -- and suddenly she was in the wrong.

She'd incurred the Lord's wrath.

There was one shining light, despite the foul stench around her - Lucifer remained by her side. He was her mentor, her lover and her constant companion. It was Lucifer who had warned her of the Lord's discontentment with the world, and he had shielded Lilith and her tribe from the Great Flood when God's displeasure had been realized. Lucifer had kept every promise he had made to her - from her wishes for Eve, to the agreements he'd made with Lilith for herself and her followers. Of course, he took some liberties in the process: along with her crown, Lucifer bestowed Lilith with the Gemma Aeternitas, as well as the matching strength, speed, and indestructibility of her mate --

---

"The who-what now?" Buffy demanded.

Spike rolled his eyes. "If you'd stop bloody interruptin' me, you'd know now, wouldn't you?"

Buffy scowled at him fiercely, and he chuckled relenting. "All right, all right." He held up the ring. "Gemma Aeternitas. The Gem of Eternity. Lilith's..." Spike stopped, a look of quiet consideration appearing on his face. Buffy sat up abruptly, tugging on his arm.

"What? What is it?"

A tiny shadow of a smile lifted the corner of his lips. "Nothin' to worry your pretty head over, love."

Buffy blinked. "Umm... okay? Continue, please?"

Spike rolled his eyes again.

---

At Lilith's request, Lucifer had tied her lifeline to the Turok-han's. Should her mate ever be killed, Lilith's own heart would stop. Her body and mind would remain functional, but for all other appearances, Lilith would be dead.

The Creator would not be able to find her, for she would become the definition of soulless.

Lucifer also ensured that she and her mate would be fertile. The night that her first child was born was a night of absolute wonderment for her, as she was sure it had been for Eve. She named the boy Seff, and her mentor, mate and clan all gazed upon the child in awe. Seff, the first child born of the real first woman, had Lilith's human features and her entrancing beauty. Unlike his mother, however, he had the ability to shift between his human features, and the demonic face he shared with his father.

He was not the only child Lilith would ever have. As promised to her by Lucifer, her children would be numerous and would populate the earth. Her body was conditioned to sustain the brunt of multiple pregnancies, and she birthed nearly a hundred children a night.

Seff, however, was Lilith's first child, and her first-born son, and in that, he was her favourite.

He was also the beginning of a new era on earth. He was the first hybrid. He was the reason that the vampire half-breeds of the future would exist.

Seff was born eighteen years after the Great Flood, when the world had been washed clean of the sin that had littered it. By the time Seff reached his eighteenth birthday, Lilith had existed in the world for 1,692 years -- a full 762 years after Adam's death.

Unknown to Lilith, her son eventually would set in motion a chain of events that would change the world as she knew it -- and the changes would not be pleasant.

---

He was such a damn fool. Why did he even bother to open his mouth?

He should have known not to give Buffy information she wasn't ready for - especially after she'd been beaten and bludgeoned by the very creature they were discussing. After all, Buffy had that nasty habit of retreating when given too much information at once.

And yet, Spike had still brought it on himself.

The hyperventilating had started round about the time that Spike had told her of Lilith's approximate age and time on Earth. Sobs and half words were escaping her lips, and Spike was sure he heard the words, "dying," and "gonna kill me" somewhere in the muddle. Giving a loud growl that may or may not have rocked the foundations of the house, Spike grabbed her shoulders and shook her.

"Knock it off, Slayer!" he snarled. "She's not going to kill you! She's after me, remember? An' if she's thinkin' to get anywhere near you, she's gonna have to go through me to do it, because I am not lettin' a bloody thing happen to you, you barmy bint!"

Sigh. Only Spike could vow to protect her, and insult her in the exact same sentence. Was it weird that this actually comforted her?

Buffy forced her breathing to slow, gripping Spike's upper arms tightly until he nearly bled from the nail indents she made. She barely noticed his grimace of pain, but at least he'd managed to get her to come back to herself again. She slumped into his arms gratefully, nuzzling his chest.

"Spike, what are we going to do? How the hell are we even going to be able to beat her? She nearly killed me!" she groaned.

Spike huffed in irritation -- not irritation at Buffy, but irritation at the whole situation. "I don't know, Slayer... The bitch is damn near invincible. We'd be lucky to wound her, even if it was just temporary."

Buffy turned her head up and stared at him in disbelief. "What the hell is wrong with you? I can't believe you just said that!"

"What?!"

"Spike, that was the point in the conversation where you were supposed to say that we would beat her no matter what the odds!"

He scoffed. "Well, yeah, if you wanted me to bold-faced lie to you! As it happens, we need to deal with the truth!"

"It wouldn't kill you to lie to me to build my hopes up!"

"Lying to you would lull you into a sense of false security and get you killed!"

"It would not! It would empower me with the whole girl power thing, and I'd be confident and I'd be able to beat her, and we could do that happily ever after thing like we're supposed to be doing, you great big ass!"

"... What?"

Buffy suddenly snapped her lips shut, staring at him wide-eyed. Dammit -- foot-in-mouth strikes again. Could she ever learn to not talk? "Nothing!" she squeaked.

Spike stared at her with what looked like a mixture of awe and surprise on his face. "Buffy, luv... what happily-ever-after thing? With who? Us? As in...." he sputtered for a moment, a hand waving uncertainly between them. "Us?"

Buffy scowled. "No, I mean us as in me, Dawn and the mailman!" she sneered. Smacking his chest, a big pout pushed its way onto her face. "Of course I mean you and me!"

He could just barely hear the "you idiot!" tacked onto the end of her sentence, but the words she was saying, as sarcastic and irritating as they were, had firmly caught his attention.

She wanted to be with him? She was admitting it?

Actually, he needed clarification first. "Now, when you say you an' me, you mean..."

Ugh, men! Why was it that when Buffy finally decided what she wanted, they all turned stupid? She gazed at him in irritation. "I mean that I want to be with you, Spike!" She sighed and the look in her eyes softened as she took in the hope in his face, her hand reaching up to caress his cheek. "I miss you... and I don't care what anyone says anymore. I want to be with you. I don't ever want to lose you again. When I thought you were falling for Lilith, I was terrified that I would! I was so scared that I would never get the chance to... That I wouldn't be able to say that... to tell you t-that I --"

Whatever Buffy wanted to say, Spike wouldn't know til later. The minute she stopped talking to take a breath, Spike lunged at her, rolling her beneath him on the bed and pressing his lips to hers ecstatically.

Hell, he was sick of waiting, of pretending not to be affected by her. There wasn't much Buffy could do that would make him ignore her, and all the pretending he'd done up until now was exhausting. Buffy was finally admitting her feelings - sort of - to him, and he was going to take full advantage of that fact.

He bloody loved this woman. And he was going to do everything in his power to show her that, once and for all.

If he'd thought that Buffy would protest, he was dead wrong. Rather, she'd resumed her octopus impersonation from before, clinging to him with both arms and legs, while accepting his kisses and returning them enthusiastically. Her arms came up from his sides and she happily threw them around Spike's neck, nuzzling him gently.

"I'm gonna hazard a guess and say that you agree with me?" she asked, looking up at him with both hope and apprehension.

He smiled down at her, blue eyes sparkling, before he bent his head and kissed her nose. "More than agreein’ here, sweetheart." His lips seemed to tremble for an instant, and she almost gasped out loud at how vulnerable it made him look. He tightened his jaw and tilted his head, looking at her pleadingly. "This isn't a dream, is it, luv?"

A wide smile stretched across Buffy's lips, and she shook her head. "Not a dream. Very real. See?" She took hold of his side between two fingers and pinched. Hard.

"OW! God-dammit, Buffy!" he snapped. Glaring at her, he pinched her back, then slapped her ass, asking, "Was that really soddin' necessary?"

Buffy squealed at the retaliation, trying to slap him away from her, only to have his hand come down on her ass once more, palm flat. "Ow, ow! Spike, quit it, I'm sorry!"

Spike snorted. "You little liar, you're not a bloody bit sorry!" he answered, then pinched her again before settling himself more firmly on top of her, locking both of his legs in a firm grip around hers. His hand came down again, slapping each side of her ass, and she shrieked, arching herself into him.

"Ack! Spike, stop! I'm sorry, I swear, I really, really am please stop stop stop!" she yelped, twisting and turning under him as she tried her hardest to escape.

Spike chuckled, leaning down to kiss the crown of her head. "All right, all right, we'll say I believe you. I'll stop." He shot her a mischievous grin as he rolled her over flat onto her back. "Now, prove how sorry you are an' gimme a kiss, sweets," he continued as his hand rubbed soothingly over the marks he'd left on her bottom. She giggled and squirmed at the feeling, leaning up.

"Gladly," she murmured happily, catching his lips.

He kissed her sweetly, his hand wasting no time in running under her shirt and flattening against the smooth, taut expanse of her belly. Quickly, he began forcing the shirt up, exposing her skin, and Buffy lifted herself by the heels of her feet, arching her back to help him pull the material off. She whimpered discontentedly when the top forced their lips to separate so that Spike could clear it away from her head. She wore no bra beneath the shirt and her nipples gave the appropriate response when she was finally free of the garment, hardening instantly upon contact with cooler air. However, nothing could stop the tensing in Buffy's entire body when she saw the heartbreaking look of despair and horror on her vampire's face. She flinched back slightly, pulling her arms away from him to cover herself up.

"Do I really look that bad?" she asked, her voice a whisper of a breath in the otherwise quite room. Her lower lip was trembling, and Spike's heart plummeted when he saw that she looked about ready to cry. He gazed at her brokenly, his guilt and pain evident in his own crystal blue eyes, before gathering her hands in his, pulling them away from the welts and bruises. Sighing sadly, he pressed soft kisses to her fingertips before granting a fuller kiss to her lips.

"No, sweetheart, it's not that... just... 'm such a bloody berk. I should've believed you about that lyin' bint." He raised one hand, sightlessly stroking the palm shaped bruise along her collarbone before drifting down to the yellowish-blue mottled skin of her breasts, and finally, the vague red welts along her ribs. "God... what she did to your beautiful skin..." He suddenly blinked and glanced away, and Buffy was startled to see that he had the beginnings of tears in his eyes. "I should've been with you," he continued, sounding angry. "I should've done fuckin' somethin' 'sides sulkin' like a git on the fuckin' couch! She shouldn't've gotten the chance to do this to you, Buffy!"

Her hands tugged gently away from his grasp, her mind connecting to his with understanding. Of course, her silly vampire was blaming himself for the situation as always. She reached her right hand up to cup his face, leaning in close to nudge her nose gently against his. "Spike, you couldn't have known," she said soothingly, her voice low and spilling over with her emotions. "I mean, you were asleep, and I snuck out the window like a teenager! I was so mad at you that even if you had known, I probably would've avoided you anyway." She gave him a small, self-deprecating smile. "Besides, if anyone in this house is as stubborn as me, it's you. I would've seriously been surprised if anything you would have said had managed to get through to me."

His hand moved again to trace her skin, this time maneuvering around the hand touching his face to cup her soft breast in his palm. Her eyes fluttered shut, and she cooed softly as his thumb began to toy with the distended nipple. Spike let a low growl escape as her head fell back and rolled to her shoulder before she opened her eyes to gaze dreamily at him. He glanced up at her. "You were mad at me?" he questioned, a tiny pout forming on his lips.

In reply, she gave him a nod and pouted as well, her nose scrunching cutely above her mouth. "Yes," she humphed, her lower lip jutting out pointedly in the way she knew he hadn't been able to resist from the first time she'd really used it on him -- the first time it had meant anything between them and mattered: during Willow's "Will-Be-Done" spell. At this moment, however, she ignored the sudden growl that echoed from his chest, as well as the hungry gaze he fixed on the aforementioned appendage. "That whole entire spiel in the living room that night? Yeah, that was so you would follow me up the stairs, you loser! Anya gave me that outfit -- do you understand that? Anya gave it to me, Spike! Without asking for, and I quote, 'monetary compensation'! I knew what I was doing with that damn Popsicle, you idiot!"

Spike groaned, then chuckled as he buried his face against her neck. "Right, then. Next time I think I'm bein' chivalrous when you want somethin', Buffy, feel free to aim for the nose. I wanted to chase you up those damn stairs so bad," he sighed. Shrugging guiltily, he pulled away from the crook over her neck and looked down at her hands. "I thought you were fuckin' wi' me. Thought you were tryin' ta make me lose control so you could prove a point."

Her eyes watered miserably at his explanation. God, what's been done to this man... and it's my fault. "Oh, Spike, no," she whispered, turning into his arms and nuzzling his chest. "It wasn't a test, it wasn't a trick... I wanted you. I still want you. I just want to be with you, baby." She propped her chin up on his chest so that she could peer into his eyes. "Do you understand?"

He still looked doubtful and Buffy cursed herself for dragging this man's self-esteem down so damn low that he couldn't even tell when she was being truthful anymore. She cursed herself for ever having made him think that everything he thought or did or said would be met with ridicule and hate and disgust, and that she'd never bothered to tell him how –

The light suddenly snapped on in Buffy's head. She nearly gasped out loud, because when the thought assaulted her mind she felt so stupid that, had Spike not been there and looking at her the way he was, she may have taken to smacking her head into the wall from her sheer stupidity.

There was only one way to assure Spike that she meant everything she was saying. She had to pull out the big guns. She had to tell him the truth.

It terrified her to her very bones, but really, it was long past time she told him anyway.

She rolled to her side and sat up, wrapping her legs around his waist so that she could straddle his lap. Both of her hands cupped his face to ensure that he was staring at her -- not that he ever wasn't, but one had to be sure -- and gazing at him for a moment, she placed a soft, lingering kiss on his lips before pulling back to rest her forehead against his. She was surprised that Spike didn't speak a word, especially considering that he had to have noticed how hard she was shaking. He only held her closer.

She took a deep breath.

"I love you."

A split second later, Spike's body stilled, though hers continued to shake from anticipation and fear -- God, this must have been how he'd felt when he'd first told her he loved her two years ago. She supposed it was only fair now that the tables were turned. At least there was no Drusilla and no chains. Well, maybe she wouldn't have protested against the chains this time.

He pulled back from her in achingly slow motion and Buffy bit her lip hard to keep from crying out at the acute loss. Was he going to reject her? Had she waited too long?

With the kindest smile she had ever seen him wear, and with the softest voice she'd ever imagined him using, he whispered, lips against the shell of her ear: "I know."

Stark silence.

In the next beat, she smacked his shoulder as he started to laugh, and then squealed when he yanked her close to kiss the breath from her lips. "'m sorry, baby. 've been such a git to you these last coupla weeks," he murmured, rubbing her back lovingly.

She inhaled deeply, then giggled, wrapping her arms around him tightly. "If there was a way I could deny that with a straight face for you, I would," she declared, laughing all that much harder when he uttered an indignant, "Oi!" a whole thirty seconds later. When his hands went to her sides and began tickling her in retaliation, she shrieked in stark joy, her hands slapping at him playfully. Catching both of her flailing limbs in one of his, he wrapped his other arm around her, pulled her close, and kissed her ardently. The erection he already sported at half-mast grew exponentially when she bit his lower lip in revenge.

God, he could explode just from the taste of her.

As soon as their lips met again, Buffy melted into him, closing her eyes and whimpering. When she managed to free her hands from his tight grasp, she allowed one to trail up his chest and around to the back of his neck, holding him close to her, while she bent her knees, the balls of her feet resting flat against the mattress. Her other hand took that time to prove her eagerness to be with him by sneaking in between their bodies to unclasp his jeans. The button was a little difficult to maneuver, and the zip came down easily, but both Buffy and Spike sighed in relief when the painful-looking erection encased beneath the denim sprung free and slapped wetly against Buffy's belly.

Spike groaned softly and tore his lips away from hers, burying his face in her neck as he ravished the milky skin with kisses. As she wrapped a fist around his cock, stroking him up and down at a maddeningly slow pace, his mouth trailed downward, sucking one of her nipples into his mouth and scraping his blunt teeth gently against the tip. Buffy gave a whining mewl, her head lolling about in pleasure as her own grip around his dick strengthened. In response, he gave a low growl, thrusting his hips up underneath hers, grinding as best he could against the flimsy lace panties she still wore.

"Buffy," he groaned, running a hand up her sweaty back, before letting it fall back down to cup her ass, tugging gently at her underwear.

"Mmm?" she answered, dotting light kisses all along his forehead and his incomparable cheekbones.

"Darlin'?" he whispered, gently beginning to raise and lower her tauntingly against his hardness.

Whimpering, her lips left his skin and her head fell forward onto his shoulder. "Yes?" she purred happily.

He allowed an answering purr to rumble and escape from deep within his chest, before he continued. "You need to get this god-damned thing off before I rip it off of you."

His lips curled into a smile against her skin as she let out a peal of laughter. Pushing away from him -- and ignoring his pathetic whimper of protest when his lips were no longer connected to her breast -- she held onto his shoulders and stood up carefully on the bed. Holding his gaze with a tiny smile on her lips, she hooked both of her thumbs into the sides of the barely there scrap-of-nothing she wore before tugging them down past her hips. The moment they cleared her taut thighs, she let go and they dropped to her ankles, resting against Spike's legs until she stepped out of them and kicked them away.

At which point, Spike grasped her by either thigh and yanked her down to straddle him. Buffy squealed and tried to roll off of him, but only succeeded in taking him with her. "Spike, no!" she yowled, giggling and wriggling away from him. "I'm not doing anything with you til you get your damn clothes off and join my Naked Club!"

Spike growled in frustration, hopping off of the bed reluctantly. Hurriedly, he yanked his loose jeans off, and nearly beheaded himself as his shirt cleared his hair, before he lunged for the girl on the mattress.

He was met with an armful of air and a delighted, rolling laugh.

Glancing down at the space between his arms where Buffy should be -- and more importantly, where she wasn't -- a comical expression of utter bafflement appeared on his face when he looked up and saw his Slayer standing on the other side of the bed, holding her sides from laughing so hard.

Spike was almost hurt, his confusion tuning into his insecurities and making him think for a moment that she didn't want him after all -- until he caught the undiluted joy and pure mischievousness in her lovely eyes.

So. The little bint wanted to play, did she?

Spike felt an evil grin appear on his face, and saw the grin on Buffy's falter. Then, he sprang from the bed, quick as a cat, chasing after her when she yelped and shot toward the other side of the room. Letting loose a snarl and scrabbling for her as he rounded the corner of the bed, he gave a dark, amused chuckle. "You silly little minx. After all this, you want ta play games with me?"

He stood about five feet from where she was, confronting her head-on though he could see her eyes darting from left to right, intent on finding an escape. To his great relief, she was smiling - she really was just being silly and playing love games with him.

His muscles tensed in anticipation, his blue eyes narrowing on her lithe body when she finally reacted, darting to the left before feinting and skipping to the right. Spike had expected her to pull such a trick on him, and began laughing as he jumped after her, his arm catching her around the waist. She shrieked with laughter like a teenager and squirmed when he reeled her into him, playfully attacking her neck with love bites and kisses. Dipping down for a second behind her, he lifted her up into his arms, swinging her around until she was hanging ass-up over his shoulder. Shrieking again, this time in a fit of pique and outrage, she pounded her fist into his back, kicking her legs and swinging her arms wildly. In retaliation, because he was pretty sure that one of her fists had managed to knock one of his useless lungs into his gullet, he gave her a sharp nip and a slap on the ass before dumping her teasingly back onto the bed.

"So, not even a full day an' you're already tryin' ta run from Ol' Spike, eh, blossom?" he asked, leaning over her and smiling. Instantly, her good humor seemed to be restored, and he was rewarded with that brilliant toothpaste-commercial smile.

"Never, Spike," she murmured adoringly, reaching up to stroke the scar over his brow. Suddenly, a confused frown appeared on her face. "Blossom?"

He shrugged. "New nickname I thought 'd try out on you. Like it?"

The mega-white smile was back. "I thought you were calling me Blossom, like that girl from the show."

Spike snorted. "The one with the prat who sounds like a blonde version of Harris? Not likely, sweets." He bent down and placed a noisy kiss on her cheek before worming an arm underneath her and pulling her close. "You like it, or should I use another?"

Her eyes softened and she rolled into him. "I like."

Humming against her happily, his lips touched her forehead. "Good."



TBC...



Please review, folks! This is the first new chapter in four years!!!