Buffy was stunned almost as much by the fact that he had dared utter the question as she was by the question itself. She turned slowly to look at him, her red-rimmed eyes wide and her trembling mouth open a little in disbelief. After all that had happened between them already, in spite of her failure to actually beat him the day before, she was still surprised that he had the nerve to argue or talk back to her at all.

And angry that he was quite possibly right in doing so.

“What did you say?” she demanded, taking a threatening step toward him, her voice angry, her eyes narrowed.

Spike did not back down.

“I asked you,” he said, his voice soft but his tone unrelenting as he met her eyes bravely and went on. “What if that *is* what you need? What if you just need someone to be here and listen while you talk about all this? I’m here to serve your needs, right? Whatever you need? And you clearly need to deal with this, because it’s bloody tearing you up inside!”

His deep, expressive blue eyes were earnest and pleading as they searched hers, and suddenly she felt that he saw straight through her façade of strength and power that had protected the Slayer from so much pain, straight through to the broken, needy girl beneath it that still felt every single hurt.

And it infuriated her.

“How dare you try to tell me what I need?” she replied, her voice low and trembling with pain and rage, as she swiftly closed the distance between them, her fists clenched at her sides and her green eyes blazing with fury. “You don’t know a *thing* about me or my life, Spike!”

“I may not know much,” he said softly, his eyes downcast now under the power of her advance, his tone and demeanor more cautious now, although he valiantly pressed on. “But I know that those two in that picture meant everything to you, and the girl I knew before wouldn’t have let *anything* come between her and them.” He paused, before venturing on, “I think…”

His words were cut off by a powerful backhand slap across his face, that rocked him back a couple of steps.

“What you *think*,” Buffy seethed, quickly moving into the space his movement had created between them, “does *not* matter! I don’t need you to psycho-analyze me and tell me what’s wrong with my life, Spike! Look at yours! I *don’t* need you, Spike! I *never* need you!”

She stood there, right in his face, her eyes gleaming with angry tears, trembling uncontrollably with the release of her rage. His words had struck too close to home for her comfort, and a part of her that was tired of holding back her painful emotions refused to let him continue. *Him*, she *could* keep from hurting her!

Spike just stood there for a few moments, not moving an inch, not even daring to turn his head back around to face her. His mind was screaming at him for caution, retreat, not to push her any further. Here was the repressed rage that he had feared would cause Buffy to break her determination as to how she intended to treat him – and she already had. That last slap had been no token blow to demonstrate her authority; she was simply furious.

He knew that her anger was not really directed at him. Really, even his words, though not really his “place” to speak, were nothing that should have upset her so deeply. No, the fury she was displaying was aimed at someone much closer to her, someone who had hurt her more deeply than he ever had.

And that made his situation of the moment just that much more dangerous. A wiser man would have just shut up right then and went into damage-control mode, trying to calm her and somehow ride out this storm of his own creation with as little actual pain as possible.

Spike had never been a very wise man.

“Then why am I here?” The softly but intently spoken question took Buffy aback a little.

She stood there for a moment, staring at him in disbelief, her mouth opening and closing several times as she tried and failed to come up with an answer. Then, suddenly, her defenses were in place again, with a vengeance, and she leaned in closer to him, her eyes narrowed dangerously, as she drew nearer to him in an intimidating way.

His voice little more than a whisper, his downcast eyes not seeing the dangerous light in her eyes, Spike added, “What do you want me to do?”

She was close enough to him to clearly hear his words, and the gentle compassion in his soft, low voice – and for a moment she wondered if he could be sincere. Could he possibly really care about the hurt and vulnerability she had foolishly allowed him to see?

*No,* she told herself firmly, fighting back her surprising desire to believe him, as the memory of his mocking words in the basement came back to her with a fresh wave of indignant anger. *It’s just an act. A very good – convincing – act that makes me want to throw myself into his arms right now – but an evil, conniving *act*. That’s all.*

Well, she would teach him right now, once and for all, not to play games with her.

She was in a position to always win.

“What do you want *me* to do, Spike?” she threw the question back at him, and though her suddenly softer tone was distracting, he did not miss the way she avoided answering it herself. As she spoke she gave him a taunting, hard little push, backing him up a few steps, then closing in to repeat the action as she went on, her tone sarcastic and mocking, “Do you want me to break down in tears and sob and pour out my whole heart to you? Tell you all about my terrible, unfaithful husband who’d rather be with cheap, vampire whores than with me?”

Her final shove put his back in contact with the wall, and he glanced up anxiously at her for a moment, wondering if she was aware of the tears that had begun to streak down her face again as she spoke. But he did not dare hold her gaze for long, looking down again and keeping his silence. He could tell that she was far from finished, and not really expecting an answer from him – yet.

She shoved him back against the wall again, hard, her soft but strong hands on his arms pinning him there as she went on with a cold, bitter smile through her tears, “You want me to turn to you for comfort in my time of need? Let you in, Spike? Let you see all my dirty little secrets and all my weaknesses, where all the sore spots are so you can just turn around and use them all against me again? Is that what you want?” she demanded, finally pausing this time to allow him to answer.

“No,” he insisted softly, an urgency in his tone. “No, that’s not what I want, Buffy…”

She slapped him again viciously, snarling in his face, “*Mistress*!”

Suddenly, he understood his mistake. Although the term of authority had seemed to bother her the day before, this little scene was about her emphasizing the distance between them – the mistake it had been for him to attempt to relate to her on a much more personal level.

“I’m sorry,” he told her, keeping his voice quiet and respectful. “I wasn’t trying to – I don’t want…”

“Why not, Spike?” she spat out the words, interrupting him so sharply that he flinched a little, pressing nearer to him in a very unsettling way, designed once again to intimidate him and remind him of her position over him – and working remarkably well, he admitted with extreme discomfort.

“You know how to ‘push all my buttons’, right?” she went on, mocking him in a tone that he recognized from a time long before this. “How to ‘get me right where you want me’?”

“I didn’t mean it like…”

Another slap silenced him, cutting off his statement before he could explain about Velvet and her goading, and suddenly all thoughts of anything else fled his mind as she pressed herself closer to him, her hand leaving his arm to rest on his hip suggestively.

“Where is it exactly that you *want* me, Spike?” she demanded, her voice lower and with a harshly triumphant note to it – as if *she* indeed had him where *she* wanted him, and had figured him out completely.

He wondered for a moment if she was not right, on both counts.

“I – I *don’t*!” he gasped, fighting his body’s natural reaction to her intimate nearness and touch, knowing that it would likely get him killed. “I mean – I wasn’t trying to – to hurt you, Bu – Mistress,” he insisted. “I swear it, I never intended to…”

“Shut up!” she commanded roughly, her tone making it clear that she did not believe a word he was saying, and he quickly obeyed.

“What do you think, Spike?” she persisted, her voice softening as her hand slowly drifted lower. “You think you can get the poor, wounded little Slayer to open herself up to you – turn to you for comfort from the pain…” She paused, her invasive hand at his hip sliding around just a little to the front as she met his eyes challengingly and went on, “Maybe get yourself a special ‘position’ in my house…to protect you…from…what, Spike? From this?”

She suddenly hit him again, without warning, then again as she repeated. “From this? Or maybe you think if you can work your way into my affections and my bed, get through my defenses, then I’ll keep *Riley* from hurting you? Is that it? Cause you know he wants to!”

“*No*!” he pleaded desperately, her vicious, relentless tone getting to him. “No, it’s not like that at all, I swear it!” He looked up into her tearful eyes, blazing with vengeful fury as she held her hand pulled back in preparation for another blow.

And suddenly, he understood just where she was coming from, as all of her words clicked into place in his mind.

This particular rant was not meant for him, as he had suspected, but it was not really meant for Riley, either. She was accusing him of all the things she thought that Riley’s girls were guilty of – using their charms to get into the affections of their master, thereby securing a certain level of safety, in spite of the fact that the exchange was to endure his unwelcome advances. Did she really think that of him? he wondered, with an oddly hurt feeling.

Did she really think that he would be willing to become her enslaved whore to escape punishment at her hands or the hands of her husband? Did she really believe that his concern for her was just an attempt to get into her good graces and serve his own best interests, achieve some level of protection in this unpleasant situation he had found himself in?

*Of course she does, mate,* he reminded himself, feeling suddenly quite disgusted with himself, as he realized how his foolish behavior the day before, his attempt to shut Velvet up, had placed him in this dangerous position now. *She heard it out of your own mouth, you bloody wanker, why *wouldn’t* she believe it?*

“What’s it like, then, Spike? Explain it to me!” Buffy ordered sharply, her invasive hand tightening on his leg, drawing his attention forcefully out of his thoughts and back to the present. She was glaring at him furiously, the accusation in her eyes deepening when she saw his gasp in reaction to her touch.

“I didn’t mean what I said!” he told her, fighting for control. “Those things I said to Velvet – I didn’t mean it at all. I was just trying to – I just wanted…” He hesitated, suddenly not even sure that he wanted to tell Buffy how Velvet had contributed to the situation – for several reasons.

To tell Buffy what Velvet had used to shake him up – the threat of being sexually dominated by Buffy herself, the threat that seemed so very real at this particular moment – might shock her out of this fit she had worked herself into, might save him from the direction things seemed to be headed.

Or it might infuriate her further, and result in the situation just spinning further out of control.

Then there was also the ever-present, though mostly in the background, threat of Riley. If Velvet was truly his favorite, as she had claimed, Spike did not think it would be wise to go running to Buffy with accusations against her. After all, Velvet had plenty of little offenses of *his* that she had witnessed, that she could easily take to *her* master – and certainly would, in retaliation, if he took this opportunity to get her into trouble.

“I just wanted to – to make her – to…” he tried again, but stopped, unable to find a safe explanation. “I didn’t want her to think…” He hesitated again, and then gave up, looking apprehensively up at his mistress for her reaction to his failed attempt at explanation.

But suddenly, unexpectedly, Buffy’s eyes softened a little, welling up with fresh tears, and she withdrew slightly, taking her hands off of him and taking a step backward, as a sudden understanding dawned in her eyes.

She turned away a little with a soft, sad laugh. “You were just shooting off your mouth,” she realized, shaking her head with a derisive little sound. She looked back at him, the corner of her mouth turning up in a little half-smirk that did not touch the misery in her eyes. “You were just being you. Right.” The last word was a question, though she stated it flatly – already sure of the answer.

Surprised and cautiously relieved at her sudden shift in demeanor, he let out a deep breath that he had not even realized he was holding. “Right. I s’pose I was,” he admitted quietly. In a way it was completely true.

“Like you ever *really* knew me well enough to make me do anything I didn’t want to do,” she scoffed, and though her tone was not exactly pleasant, it was softer, and he could feel the tension easing from the situation, as she took a couple of steps away from him.

The mockery in her tone was irritating to him, considering that he knew he really *had* been able to twist situations and make her behave as he had wanted, in at least one situation that he could recall – the fight with her friends right before their battle with Adam.

“Right. Certainly not. I was *never* able to manipulate you or push your buttons in *any* way,” he added, unable to keep the slight sarcasm from his tone, wondering even as he spoke why he hadn’t just kept his mouth shut instead of reminding her of the one time when he *had* done just that.

*Now you’ve done it,* he chided himself, closing his eyes and grimacing slightly as she slowly turned her head to look at him again, her eyes wide and surprised. *Just when she was calming down…you’ve set her off again.*

When he did not hear her respond, did not sense her move, for a long moment, he finally ventured to look back up at her cautiously. She was still staring at him, wide-eyed and disbelieving at his continued nerve. Her mouth opened slightly, and he was sure that she was about to launch into another round. And then, a funny thing happened – a thing he would never have expected at that moment.

Buffy laughed. A sound that started off soft and hoarse, sounding almost foreign and misplaced from her sob-ravaged throat, in the midst of her confusion and pain. But then it grew stronger, and became a fuller, richer sound, that was a tremendous relief to him to hear.

“God, you are such a smart ass!” she finally said in a voice of gentle amusement, shaking her head as she looked at him in wonder. “Doesn’t matter what anybody does to you…that never changes.” Oddly enough, there was no anger or frustration in her tone. In fact, he rather thought that he imagined a certain nostalgic affection in her voice, and her eyes as they softened on him.

And then, her words confirmed his suspicion, as she spoke again in a soft voice, surprised by her own words as she spoke them, as if she could scarcely believe herself that they were true.

“Spike…I think I’ve *missed* you!”