Chapter Four

*~*

Any minute now it was going to end.  He was going to wake up on a cold stone slab next to the wrong blonde and curse his subconscious for this latest experiment in cruel and unusual punishment.  This had to be a dream; there was no sodding way anything tonight actually happened.

Buffy would never let him in.  Except she had, and so he reckoned he must be dreaming.

But what a dream!  This one would surely last him a good long while and make shagging Harmony a little more bearable for the week or two he’d be able to replace her stupid grinning face with images of Buffy’s, flushed and blissful, her lips all parted and pouty while her hot breath fluttered over his cheeks.

On the off chance that he wasn’t dreaming, that he hadn’t gone off the deep end into a fantasy that would never see the light of day – or the dark of night, as it were – Spike resisted the urge to pinch himself and ruin the niggling sense of reality.  He wasn’t a stranger to the fact that one could trick one’s brain into believing all sorts of nonsense if one wanted it badly enough.  But in his hundred plus years of existence, one thing and one thing alone had always been true: Noses don’t lie.  Not vampires’ noses.

And his?  Told him to believe his brain.

The scent of her covered him.  Surrounded him, like he’d bathed in it.  Spike smirked.  More like he’d bathed in her.

A vision came to him suddenly, of Buffy in a big old claw-foot tub brimming with bubbles.  Her arms draped over its sides and her nipples peaked out of the water, rosy and hard as she arched her back and moaned wantonly.

Note to self: get bathtub.

His cock strained at his jeans, hard and eager.  Alone on the back porch of Buffy’s house, surrounded in darkness, Spike unzipped and wrapped his hand around his erection, stroking it slowly while he waited for her to come back outside, reliving in his mind the events of the night. 

He’d thought for sure the spell had broken when the band’s roadie caught them backstage with their pants down, drawing their attention to him with a particularly vulgar observation that lit Buffy’s eyes with that blazing, indignant anger he loved so much.  But then she flushed so deeply he smelled the rush of blood to her cheeks, and hid inside his coat with a whispered demand to find them a closet before she ripped the jerk’s head off, lack of pants be damned.  The nearby dressing room packed with the band’s luggage had sufficed nicely, and Spike smiled remembering his delight at her wicked giggling when he dropped them into a chair and said he hoped it belonged to the grand git himself.

He hadn’t wanted the night to end and whispered as much while he held her in his lap after.  She’d nuzzled her face into his neck and admitted that she didn’t either.

Next he knew, he was following her into the alley.  She looked bloody adorable wrapped up in his duster and little else.  Spike was half sure as they walked, side by side as somewhat more than what they were before, that he’d misheard her.  That she hadn’t agreed to spend the night with him so long as she could check in on her mum and sis first.  Her creative use of that headstone for a quickie on their shortcut through the cemetery must have knocked things around a bit in his head.  He knew she hadn’t kissed him softly before disappearing inside the house with the promise that she’d be back soon.

But she had, and Spike knew he wasn’t dreaming.  No, he was wide awake and had really spent the past few hours making love to Buffy Summers.

And she let him.  God, she let him.  Hadn’t held back, not once he called her on it, and she hadn’t held him back either.  Had she wanted to she could’ve found ways to do it, to deny the feelings he finally admitted to her, but she hadn’t.  He saw that acknowledgement in her tears and in the way she did her best to love him back.

Oh, he knew she didn’t love him – she barely tolerated him most days – but she’d tried hard to give him whatever sliver of affection she could, which turned out to be a hell of a lot more than he’d expected.

The way she felt, looked, sounded!   She’d always been gorgeous in everything she did.  Seeing her sweat and moan and shudder in pleasure, pleasure he’d brought her – he could live for another century or two and never see anything so primal, so beautiful, as Buffy when she came.  The girl was a fireball wrapped in passion, she was.  He’d known she would make an incredible lover, just as he’d known how earth-shattering the two of them could be, if she ever stopped to think about it.

And she had.  He’d seen it in her eyes – the fear, the knowledge that it could never, ever be anything short of everything with them.  He thought he’d been drowning in her before but he’d been a fool.

He wasn’t drowning.

He was burning.

Spike quickened his pace a bit, though he didn’t intend to finish anything alone here on the back porch.  No, he wouldn’t be spilling a drop tonight anywhere but inside Buffy, one way or the other.  Likely one way and the other.

He bit back a groan just thinking of that hot little mouth of hers.   She looked damn gorgeous with her lips wrapped around his cock, peeking up at him all innocent-like while doing naughty, wicked things that felt almost as good as being inside her.  His falling apart the moment she touched him wasn’t cause for debate, but Buffy’s response astounded him.  So wet just from kissing him.  So needy for his touch.  And what a sexual thing she was, hidden behind all that icy slayer exterior.  Once he broke through that, she did as much to please him as he had to her.  And she’d enjoyed both the giving and the getting.   He saw how turned on she was after sucking him off and would have loved to watch her work herself into a frenzy with her fingers had he not had other, more mutually gratifying activities in mind.  Spike squeezed his cock harder as he stroked it, thinking of how her eyes went all fluttery just before she crashed and her muscles – those searing, strangling, bloody amazing muscles – clenched around him like a vice.  He’d never felt anything like it. 

How had she managed being with Riley so long and having to hold back all the time?  Because she couldn’t possibly let go like that with the mortal twerp without breaking him in half.  Now there was a pleasant thought.  Maybe he ought to encourage that if only to take the wanker out of commission...

Spike fought a growl and barely resisted shifting faces at the thought of actually suggesting she go back to Riley.  Could she go back to him now?  She’d probably try.  Spike had enough brains left in his love-and–lust-addled head to realize that.  Didn’t mean he had to like it or sit quietly while she did it.  Nor did it mean he wouldn’t enjoy her revelation when it came that she would never truly be satisfied with this so-called normal man or any other.

And, he realized, now that he’d touched her, been consumed by her fire, nothing and no one else could ever be enough for him, either.

As if you had any doubts.

A soft click drew him out of his thoughts.  Listening closely, he heard it again and recognized it as the sound of the bolt on the front door.  Had she gone out that way for some reason?  But no, the car started a second or two later and drove off.  Joyce then, heading out for a late errand.  Above him, the bathroom window lit up and he heard the rush of water from the shower.

He wouldn’t pretend he wasn’t a little worried that going inside gave her an excuse to talk herself out of it.  Didn’t know what to make of the shower, either.  Was she freshening up or scrubbing him away?  He fretted for a few minutes, listening to the water running and imagining what she’d look like in it, except that whenever he got to the part where he joined her in her steamy haven, his mutinous brain replaced him with Finn instead.

Spike imagined he looked a bit of a nervous wreck when she crept out the backdoor a little while later, flicking on the porch light and smelling of a number of flowery products.  He stuffed himself as best he could back inside his jeans and turned to greet her.  She wore his coat, which would’ve done wonders for his worries if everything else about her hadn’t screamed something’s wrong.   He saw it in her tight little smile she gave him in return and the hunch of her shoulders as she crossed the porch.

She glowed on the walk back here, with her cheeks flushed from sex and her eyes bright and wide and teasing.  Her stride had a particular bounce to it, as though she felt light and carefree.  She laughed and squealed and let him chase her through the cemetery, and when he caught her, flashed him a lascivious grin he couldn’t resist that led to their getting up close and personal with one Mrs. Walters, 1901-1979.  He’d loved seeing that playfulness, even if it existed only for the moment, as he was one half of the reason for it.  Now, she took slow steps forward, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, and though her cheeks were pink from the shower’s warmth, they lacked the lively colour of before. 

“You all right?” he asked, after a brief hesitation.  He didn’t want to suggest she wasn’t, but...well, she didn’t look all right.

She refused to look at him as she slumped down beside him at the top of the steps.  “Don’t stop on my account.”

Of course her downcast eyes would focus on his crotch, where his unbuttoned and half-zipped jeans, strained tight over his erection, easily gave him away.  “It’s precisely your account that’s got me in this state to begin with, love.”

The gentle teasing seemed to work, and her gaze flicked up to his and she smiled softly.  Then she giggled, a twittery, girlish laugh and he thought maybe he’d been wrong.  Maybe she was just tired or something.  But no – the giggle dissolved into a choked sigh and Buffy burst into tears.

Anger he could handle.  Let her scream at him, throw punches, or hell, even threaten him with a stake.  Anything but tears.  He never knew what to do when they cried, especially when he thought he might have caused it.

Buffy had her face buried in her hands and her shoulders shook.  Tentatively, Spike patted her back through the leather.

“Is there...” He paused, unsure, as she looked up at him, her cheeks streaked with tears and makeup and more sorrow than he’d ever seen.  “Can I do something, love?”

She launched herself at him, throwing her arms around his middle and burying her face in his chest.  Startled, Spike froze, having no clue what to do with the weeping bundle of sobbing slayer now wetting his shirt with her tears and shaking his body with her shuddering.  So he did the only thing he could – tightened his arms around her and held her as she cried. 

“Shh, sweetheart,” he whispered, stroking her hair, hoping he wasn’t making things worse by offering comfort.  “It’ll be all right, yeah?”

She burrowed deeper into his arms and cried harder.

He felt like an awkward git trying to comfort her.  It had to have taken a lot for her to break down like this, especially in front of him.  Spike understood pride and he liked to think he understood Buffy, how she hid herself and couldn’t bear to let others see her as anything less than strong and in control.  From one fighter to another, he knew where that came from, that need to cover up any weakness with a confident exterior, lest somebody take advantage of it.  Spike didn’t know whether to be honoured that she felt she could show him this side of her, or terrified over the apparent tragedy that left her in this sobbing mess.  If it were something so horrible she’d have broken down no matter who was with her...

Spike didn’t want to contemplate that.  Might not mean a thing to him, but he hated seeing her this way.  Compassion wasn’t something he, as a rule, let himself feel too often, except he couldn’t prevent it when it was Buffy.  He’d tried and failed often enough to know how hopelessly lost in her he was.  Anything that broke her inevitably broke him, too.

Eventually she calmed but didn’t pull away.  She did loosen her hold, turning to curl into his side with her head pillowed on his shoulder and her palm on his chest.  Spike kissed her forehead but said nothing, waiting with patience he wasn’t sure he possessed for her to decide whether or not to talk to him.

Her breath hitched and she said, “It’s my mom.”

A stab of fear lanced through his chest, bringing with it the buzz of adrenaline usually reserved for a good fight or a thrilling chase.  He pulled away from her to look directly into her eyes.

“What...is she okay?”

Buffy shrugged.  “I don’t know.  She—” She stopped suddenly, looking on the verge of tears again.  “I don’t know if...I can’t—”

Rumbling quietly, Spike pulled her back to him, trying to ignore the pleasant feeling of having her fit so nicely cuddled up to his side.   Now wasn’t the time to bask.

“Whatever it is,” he said, touching his lips to her forehead as he spoke, “you can tell me.”

Her answering sigh sounded very tired.  “If I tell you, then it’s real,” she said, her voice so quiet and timid Spike could barely hear her.

He didn’t like the sound of that.  Not one little bit.  But he waited, not wanting to push, either.  Buffy said nothing for a few minutes, sitting quietly tucked up against him, fiddling with a little tear in his shirt and staring off into the darkness beyond the porch lights.

“I’m scared, Spike.”

That couldn’t have been an easy thing to admit.  Spike looked down at her, at her tear-stained face looking up at him, and brushed her cheek with his fingers.  “Of what, love?”

Biting her lip, she looked away again, and started talking.  The whole story spilled out in halting, hushed words.  Little nothings.  Headaches.  CAT scans.   Hospitals.  Dawn unaware, at a friend’s for the night, wouldn’t tell her until they were sure.  She didn’t come out and say it, but every word she spoke revealed how terrified she was.  How lost.  That stab of fear grew into a twisting knot of worry in his stomach.

If Joyce—

No, he wouldn’t even entertain that thought.

When she finished, Buffy moved away to sit beside him, glancing at him out of the corner of her eyes before quickly looking away, a light flush colouring her cheeks.  She stayed close enough that he was certain her reaction was a result of her breakdown itself and not because of him, but he felt relieved anyway when he patted her leg and she covered his hand with hers.

“Thank you,” she said.  “I—I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“Can’t be strong all the time, Buffy,” Spike answered.  “Something like this, I’d be worried if you didn’t have a cry.”

She exhaled a huffing breath.  “That’s the thing, though.  I have to be strong.”  She looked at him briefly before staring down again at their hands.  “Who else is gonna be if I’m not?”

He wrinkled his nose at her.  “There’s a difference between being strong and being human.”

Her laugh this time held a little more humour.  “Because you know so much about being human.”

His lips twitched and he nodded in concession.  “Point.  But even the strongest need a shoulder to lean on sometimes, you know?”

One corner of her mouth lifted into a hint of a smile.  “Let me guess – that shoulder’s yours?”

Spike wasn’t sure whether her little grin was meant to tease him for being foolish enough to fall in love with her and let her know it, or because she actually liked the thought that he could be there for her, if she wanted.

The former being so typically Buffy and yet not the Buffy of tonight, Spike chose to assume the latter.

“Could be,” he said, removing his hand from her leg to wrap his arm round her.  “Would be in a heartbeat.”  He looked directly into her wide-open eyes.  “You know that, right?”

She held his gaze a moment before flicking her eyes away, and he wondered if he’d wandered a little too far down the emotional road.  But then her head met his shoulder and she softly answered, “Yeah.  I do.”

Well.  Spike hadn’t expected that.  The president of the soulless-equals-heartless club essentially admitted that he, Spike, a vampire in supreme lack of a soul, not only loved her but wanted to love her.  She hadn’t agreed to it, mind you, but acknowledgement was more than half the battle.

Wanker.

Here he was thinking about himself again with his would-be lady still on the verge of tears and probably sick with worry over her mother’s health.  

Spike tuned out his own selfish thoughts – well, pushed them back a bit, at least – and focused on Buffy.  She wasn’t crying now, and he could feel her taking slow, deep, calming breaths.  He started making light circles on her back and she responded by drawing nonsense patterns into his thigh with her fingertips.  After a few minutes, Buffy leaned into his touch and he pressed a little harder, finding knotted muscles even through the coat.  Her quiet moan encouraged him, and he exchanged his fingers for his thumb, touching a nasty spot near her shoulder blade that made her jump and gasp.

“Sore?”

Buffy nodded, rolling her shoulder and grimacing when the motion drove his thumb into the spot again.

“Come here.”

She slid down a step to sit in front of him.  Spike pulled his duster off her shoulders and went to work on the knot, finding its twin on the other side. 

“Oh, God,” Buffy said, groaning.  She snorted and glanced up at him.  “How is it that you manage to find that spot no matter what you’re doing?”

Spike dug his thumbs in, and her eyes squeezed shut and her lips parted around a sighing moan.

“If it puts that look on your face,” he said, “then who cares?”

Buffy chuckled and turned her head to look back out across the yard, making occasional small noises in response to his thumbs’ efforts, but saying nothing else.  Spike worked her shoulder knots for a while, but the temptation to turn his touch into a caress got the better of him and soon he was stroking her neck with his fingertips.  Buffy sighed and shivered with the lighter touch.

“Spike?” she whispered.

“Mmm?”

“I can’t go...to your place,” she said, and he tensed, a feeling of dread rising in his stomach with what sounded an awful lot like the beginnings of rejection.

“Right,” he said, moving his hands to his knees and clenching them into fists.  “Just let me know when I’ve worn out my welcome, then, Slayer, and I’ll be on my way.”

“No.”  Buffy spun around to face him, wincing a little and pressing her hand into her belly.  “No, Spike, I mean—” She laid a hand over one of his fists.  “I should be here, just in case, but...could you stay?”

Spike blinked, certain that she couldn’t possibly have asked that question.  “Stay here? ”

“Yes,” she said, prying his fingers loose and lacing them with hers.  “Here.  Will you stay with me?”

Spike didn’t answer her right away.  He couldn’t, even with her pleading eyes staring at him, waiting.  He wanted to – he’d be an even bigger fool than he already was to doubt that – but he also wanted her, all of her.  Back at the Bronze, she was fully with him every minute.  Making love to him because she wanted to.  Because she wanted him.   But now, with her concerns about Joyce weighing on her mind...

Back to being a selfish wanker, is it?

There she was, fresh off a crying jag because her mother might be seriously ill, with him about to go all emotional blackmail on her because she needed the comfort a little more than she needed him.  It was difficult enough for her to ask in the first place and he was what?  Going to say no just because her priorities changed?

Yeah, great plan, Spike.

He realized he was taking too long to answer when her shoulders slumped and she pulled her hand out of his, moving to sit beside him.

“Dunno, love,” he said, trying for a teasing tone.  “Sure it’s me you want?  Could call Willow, you know, or, uh, someone.”

Buffy’s forehead wrinkled and she pushed out her lower lip.  “Don’t you want to stay?” she asked.

“Course I do,” he said, pushing at her lip and holding in his sigh of relief when she smiled.  “Tonight was...the most incredible night of my life, Buffy.”

He watched her eyes widen with his admission, and then she breathed out heavily.  “Good,” she said, poking him in the sternum with her finger.  “Because I could call Willow, or I could go to Riley.”

When he flinched, Buffy smiled and trailed her fingers down his chest.  “I could , but I don’t want them, I want you.  I...”  She dropped her gaze from his and lowered her voice to continue.  “I don’t do helpless, and I think you get that.”

He most certainly did.  Spike squeezed her hand in response, heartened when she returned the gesture and looked into his eyes again.    

“I-I’m not ready for tonight to end either,” Buffy said in a whisper.  “I want what we had in the Bronze, before this, before—”

She stopped, her next breath shaky, her eyes starting to water.  Spike tucked her hair behind her ear and Buffy shook her head, scrubbing at her face with her free hand.  When she looked back at him, her eyes, though misty, were wide open and sure.

“Please, just love me, Spike, okay?” she whispered.  “Can you do that?”

Spike couldn’t tell if she was being completely genuine, or if she’d already figured out how to get what she wanted by saying just the right words.  He liked to think she meant it; it wasn’t like Buffy to say these sorts of things just willy-nilly like that.  But it didn’t matter anyway.  It should never have mattered.  Buffy needed him, in one capacity or the other.  She picked him over her best friend – over her boyfriend - and he hadn’t the strength or the will to deny her. 

“Yeah, Buffy, I can do that.”

“So you’ll stay?”

“I’ll stay.”

*~*