Chapter 19
 
Spike had scoured the mansion for toilet rolls, looking in vain in the various storage areas, eventually finding two dusty, half-used ones in other bathrooms. When he had returned and proudly presented them to a highly mortified Buffy, she’d been horrified to discover that he’d gone prospecting for them stark naked.
 
That was why she’d insisted that he should get dressed to go downstairs in turn to fetch her jacket and bag, and then the maps.
 
Her argument had been that he wouldn’t be able to wander around the house naked once they had their own place because of Annie’s presence, and potentially Tara’s and Dawn’s, and the sooner he broke the habit, the better. There had been the threat of robes. And even pyjamas. He shuddered at the memory.
 
He huffed in exasperation and tossed the phone onto the bed. “You talk to the git, slayer. He said he can get his paws on a truck and the range of stuff we’ve decided we’ll need, but now he’s whining about losing a day’s overtime tomorrow and saying he can’t help ‘til Sunday.”
 
Spike took off his jeans and slipped in beside Buffy who was sitting up in bed, legs crossed Indian style, wearing only a sweater she’d pulled from her bag. She was leaning forward over the map, her bare rump sticking up in the air in a most tantalising manner.
 
He tuned out her persuasive wheedling and cupped one peachy buttock. Then with a mischievous smirk, he twisted sideways, gently grasped her hips, ducked his face underneath her and gave her glistening pink petals a leisurely lick.
 
Her reaction was perhaps extreme, if not totally out of character. She yelped, reared up on her knees, flung her free hand out and shoved him out of bed.
 
He lay on the floor, speechless with shock. Then her flushed little face peeked over the edge of the bed and wide-eyed, she whispered, “You pig! You can’t do that when I’m on the phone to Xander! Ew!”
 
Spike got up, chortling at her scandalised tone. Buffy eyed him warily as she made feeble excuses to Xander for the interruption and resumed her pleading for him to meet them in the morning.
 
Impatient to get to the more fun parts of the night, as he climbed back into bed Spike suggested, “Look, if he’s so hung up on losing a few quid, Valentine’s Day’s coming up. Tell him that once we’ve found the treasure, he can have his pick of gaudy trinkets for his bird.” Buffy looked at him in disbelief and he added hastily, “But only after we’ve found my gem and you’ve picked out something for yourself.”
 
While Buffy continued her conversation, Spike curled around her, slipping his hands under her sweater to caress the warm silky skin of her back. He was careful not to startle her again, not wanting to repeat his undignified exit from the bed.
 
“Yes, Xander, I know exactly what I’m doing,” Buffy said, absently reaching back to run her fingers through Spike’s tousled hair. “I know it seems sudden, but it isn’t a Riley reboundy thing. It was always Spike, even when I couldn’t remember him. Can you just give him a chance? For me?”
 
Spike grabbed her hand and kissed her palm, going on to nibble at her fingertips. “There’s my slayer,” he murmured fondly, “you tell him.”
 
“Oh, that’s great! Nine o’clock at the corner of Oak and University Row. Got it. See you then, Xander. Thank you so much.” Buffy ended the call and pressed a few more buttons on her phone before putting it on the night table. As she folded up the map and laid it aside, she said, “I’ve set my alarm for seven thirty. That should give us enough time…”
 
She tugged her sweater over her head, dropped it beside the bed and snuggled down into Spike’s arms. They instinctively adjusted their positions until they lay chest to chest, legs entwined with Spike’s growing erection pressed between their bellies.
 
Buffy leaned forward to kiss him, but just as their lips were about to make contact, her mouth opened wide in a yawn. She pulled back slightly and brought her hand up to cover her mouth, flushing in embarrassment. When her mouth finally consented to close, she said, “Oh, I’m so sorry!”
 
“’m I boring you, love?” Spike said with a mock pout.
 
“No, not boring. Never boring.” She leaned towards him once more. “Let’s try that again…” This time their lips made contact and they both relaxed into the embrace, hands beginning the familiar gentle inventory of each other’s bodies.
 
Spike had drawn Buffy over to lie on top of him in preparation for the next stage in the expected activities when a kiss suddenly went wrong. Instead of continuing to tangle with his own, Buffy’s tongue abruptly disappeared and she broke contact, raising her head and once more covering her mouth with a free hand.
 
Spike could clearly hear the joints each side of Buffy’s face creaking with the strain. So that’s what they meant by a jaw-cracking yawn.
 
“Oh my god!” she sighed when she was finally able to relax. “I’m so sorry! I guess it’s been a long day.” She slowly crumpled, half onto him and half beside him. Wrapping her arms around his waist, she buried her face in the crook of his neck. Sheepishly, she said, “Would you be very mad if we didn’t…? I really am kinda beat.”
 
Spike stroked her hair back from her face then wrapped his arms around her and settled her more comfortably into his side, with her head pillowed on his shoulder.
 
One thing that he had come to realise once he’d got to know Buffy in Los Angeles was that he’d never truly experienced emotional closeness with anybody before. Even with Drusilla, he’d always felt a certain distance. The level of fulfilment and companionship he’d experienced with Buffy by the time they had parted had been a revelation.
 
Inevitably, he was going to be left a little frustrated, but just having her here, spending the night in his bed, in his arms, meant more to him than he could possibly put into words.
 
“You sleep, Buffy love. Plenty of time for the other.”
 
“M’cue,” she murmured.
 
Almost immediately, her breathing slowed, her body slumped in total relaxation and she was fast asleep.
 
For several hours, Spike revelled in simply watching her. Occasionally he couldn’t resist the urge to stroke her warm cheek tenderly or kiss the top of her head, taking care not to disturb her. However, as the night progressed, the steady double beat of her heart, and the luxurious warmth, gradually lulled him to sleep.
 
 
~*~*~*~
 
 
Buffy shivered. She pulled her jacket tighter and wrapped her arms around her middle, peering out of one of the little holes she’d scratched in the paint blacking out the DeSoto windows. Still no sign of Xander and his truck.
 
She sighed then shivered again. Having to wash in cold water then eating a cold cereal breakfast was not her ideal way to begin the day in February. She hunched her shoulders against the draught from the ill-fitting car window.
 
“Cold, love?” Spike asked absently, eyes glued to the rear-view mirror. “Should have had a hot shower to set you up for the day.”
 
Buffy slowly turned to him and glared. “Hot shower? And how exactly do you propose I should have had a hot shower in a house with no hot running water?”
 
“Shower’s electric. As long as we’ve got power, the hot water’ll never run out.”
 
Buffy’s eyes narrowed dangerously at her vampire who seemed oblivious to the heinous crime he had committed. “And you choose now to share that little snippet of information? You couldn’t have told me, I don’t know, when I was shivering in the bathroom, washing in freezing cold water, for example?”
 
He shrugged carelessly. “You never asked.”
 
“I never…?”
 
Buffy’s incipient rant was interrupted when Spike abruptly sat forward and turned the key in the ignition. “And about bloody time too. Your boy’s here, slayer. Give him a wave to follow us, yeah?”
 
Taken aback, Buffy did exactly that. She forced the stubborn window down just enough to get her arm through the gap and waved in the traditional ‘follow me’ gesture.
 
Once their mini convoy was established, she jiggled the window closed again, turned her attention to Spike and stammered, “But I thought…” She gestured over her shoulder at the rapidly disappearing manhole cover which she’d assumed would be their access point to the tunnels. “Manhole!”
 
Spike chuckled and she subsided in her seat, pouting.
 
“I don’t get it.”
 
“Can you really see us getting all the boy’s gear down that itty bitty hole, slayer?”
 
Buffy felt a little foolish that she hadn’t actually considered that point.
 
“So where are we going?”
 
“You’ll see…”
 
Once clear of the college campus, Spike sped up and Buffy swivelled in her seat to check that Xander was keeping up. The big flat-bed truck had scaffolding poles and planks tied to the roof of the cab and slanting down to the rear, each end adorned with big flapping pieces of red cloth.
 
With her attention focused to the rear, she was startled when the car lurched as Spike turned off the road onto hard-packed earth and they began slowly bumping up a rocky slope, swerving to avoid scraggly shrubs and jagged rocks. After a quick glance ahead to see where they were heading, she turned again, anxiously watching Xander’s progress. He handled the laden truck with professional ease, despite the rough going.
 
Suddenly everything went dark and looking up, she saw that they’d driven straight into a big cave, which looked vaguely familiar. A few seconds later, Xander drew in behind them.
 
“The Initiative?” Buffy asked, looking around as she climbed out of the car. “You’ve brought us to the Initiative?”
 
“Thought that was probably what it was. I was looking for easier access for the equipment when I found this place.” He pointed to the wide entrance to a tunnel at the rear of the cave. “A little way down there, there’s a massive metal door set in the rock. There’s a narrow passage going off to the side. That’s where we’ll be heading.”
 
Spike began to help Xander untie the ropes securing the scaffolding so that they could remove it and stack it to one side. He smirked as he indicated one of the pieces of equipment revealed by the removal of the big planks. “When I saw that, I figured there’d be some handy electricity in there to nick for the drill.”
 
“Yeah, Buffy. We can’t use a diesel powered compressor for the jackhammer in an enclosed space. This is an electric one. I’ve got a bunch of long extension cables for it. There’s some flashlights and battery powered floodlights too,” Xander said.
 
“Wow,” Buffy said. “Go Xander! You’re like a constructy Boy Scout. All prepared and everything.”
 
The next hour or so was spent humping everything through the tunnels to the cavern that Spike had pinpointed for the start of the excavation, setting up the lighting, and stacking the tools and equipment in neat piles.
 
Xander straightened his back after adjusting the last floodlight to an angle to illuminate the remaining shadowed area of domed cavern roof. Looking up, he clapped his hands and rubbed them together briskly. “So, where do you want to start, then?”
 
 
~*~*~*~
 
 
“Not like that, you bleached idiot! Do it the way I showed you!” Xander yelled up to Spike who was fumbling with a stubborn scaffolding connector.
 
“But…”
 
“No! No buts! Use the freaking spirit level! If the uprights aren’t plumb and the platforms aren’t level, the whole thing will become unstable. Trust me when I say you really don’t want that!”
 
Spike glared down at the young human who had somehow assumed the status of foreman of the project. He fidgeted with the stupid, uncomfortable, yellow hard hat the boy had insisted they all should wear and clamped his mouth shut around his irritation. When they’d got up to the second level and he’d refused point blank to wear the security harness, the boy had nearly had an apoplectic fit. Spike had reluctantly admitted that they really needed Harris’ expertise to help them get the treasure and so it wouldn’t do to piss him off again.
 
“Bloody hell,” he muttered. He reached for the long spirit level and made a big show of laying it along the scaffolding pole he was trying to attach to the corner upright. He surreptitiously lowered his end several inches until the bubble was dead centre and the connector which had previously refused to lock, fixed easily into place. “There. All done and level,” he called down. “Satisfied now, General Harris, sir?
 
At Xander’s nod and hand signal for A-OK, Spike looked over to where Buffy was standing next to the pile of scaffolding parts. “Send up the next pole, slayer!”
 
Buffy easily lifted one of the long aluminium pipes and raised one end into the air like a pole vaulter preparing for her run up.
 
“Not that one, Buffy, he needs a couple of the short cross bracers diagonally across the end next, with these swivel connectors,” Xander instructed, directing Buffy towards a different pile.
 
Spike was frustrated by how thorough the boy was insisting they should be, which made progress frustratingly slow. He was impatient to get going. He called down, “But…”
 
“I told you,” Xander raised a warning fist, “but me no buts. There’s no way I’m gonna risk Buffy on an unstable platform.” He added slyly, “I wouldn’t have thought you’d want to either.”
 
Well, that was downright underhanded. Spike subsided sulkily and obediently crawled into position to attach the cross bracers at the end of the structure.
 
Buffy lifted one of the smaller poles, cocked her head as she squinted to aim, and then expertly shot it up to arrive neatly in Spike’s outstretched hand.
 
 
~*~*~*~
 
 
“To your left a little,” Xander panted, twisting to get a better look at the readings.
 
Shuffling across the planking on her shoulders, butt and heels, Buffy edged the cumbersome device over a few inches and held it up so that the wheels were firmly in contact with the rock above them.
 
“Okay, now push it slowly towards me.”
 
The pair wriggled awkwardly along the wooden platform, with Buffy manoeuvering the machine while Xander kept his eyes locked on the little screen.
 
“Stop! There!” Xander pointed to a spot on the rock. “That’s the thinnest place.”
 
“So I can drop this stupid thing now then?” Buffy asked hopefully.
 
“No! For god’s sake don’t drop it! Those things cost a fortune and if we break it, I’ll be paying for it out of my wages for years.”
 
Buffy rolled her eyes and squinted down to her side. “You there, honey?”
 
“Yeah, let it go, baby.”
 
Buffy rolled to the side and swung the GPR trolley over until it cleared the side of the scaffolding, then released it to the accompaniment of an anxious whimper from Xander.
 
There was a quiet grunt from below as Spike caught it. “Don’t get yer knickers in a twist, Harris. Not a scratch on your precious radar doohickey.”
 
Puffing out a quick breath in relief, Xander reached into his pocket, produced a small spray can and painted a big yellow X on the rock overhead.
 
He then expertly swung himself off the platform, adjusted his safety harness and clambered down to the ground.
 
Buffy crawled to the edge and jumped, landing lightly beside him.
 
The three of them looked up at the mark which was towards one end of the scaffolding platform.
 
“You’d better hope that void is your mystery crypt.” Xander unfastened and shed his harness. “If it’s someone’s stinky septic tank, I will not be a happy Xanderman.”
 
“You’re not the only one!” Spike said.
 
Buffy suddenly started laughing.
 
The two guys shared a look then regarded her in bemusement.
 
“X marks the spot!” she gasped out between giggles, pointing up to the big yellow X. “It really does!”
 
Spike shook his head fondly and patted her on the shoulder. “Yeah, love. That it does.” He headed towards the pile of equipment, picked up the jackhammer and carried it across to the tower. “Time to get cracking at last!” he announced gleefully.
 
“Uh, not quite yet,” Xander said, tapping the pile of reels of extension cable with his foot. “First we need to go prospecting in the Initiative for power.”