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Three for a Secret... by Lilachigh
 
Chp 3 All Cats are Grey
 
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Three for a Secret by Lilachigh


Chapter 3 All Cats are Grey


One for Silver,
Two for Gold,
Three for a Secret that shall never be told


Buffy was eating a slice of pizza when Dawn came hurtling through the front door, home from school and obviously in a bad mood, “Don’t ask!” she said, taking the last slice from the box. “I hate school. The teachers are just dumb.”

Buffy licked her fingers. “Er...right. Any particular one?”

“Mrs Murphy. Our history teacher. She is so dumb it isn’t true.”

“I thought you got on quite well with her?”

Dawn tossed back her long dark hair and crammed the rest of the pizza sideways into her mouth. “Nog angy mob.”

Buffy, having had years of translating Xander while he was eating, managed to make “Not any more” out of her sister’s mumbled reply.

Dawn swallowed. “I had to do an essay on the causes of the First World War in Europe. i got Spike to give me all these really neat details and facts, because he was around. And Mrs Murphy said I had a vivid imagination and had made them all up. She wanted me to quote my research material.”

“And you couldn’t very well say William the Bloody told you,” Buffy said with a smile.

Dawn sighed and poured herself some milk. Buffy watched, alarmed at just how quickly milk vanished in this house. But what could she say - I’ve no money, drink water, it’s free.

“And Buffy, it was really odd. I went round to see Spike on the way home from school and - ”

“Dawn! How many times have I told you, I don’t want you hanging out with Spike.”

The teenager scowled. “I suppose you’ve been nagging at him about me. I bet that’s why he wouldn’t let me inside his crypt. He came to the door and said he was a bit tied up and would speak to me later on. And I wanted to tell him about Mrs Murphy.”

Buffy hesitated, then said, in as off-hand a fashion as she could, “Was there anyone else there with him, did you see?”

“What? Oh, I’ve no idea. I could hear the TV in the background and someone laughing. I expect it was Clem.”

Buffy sat on at the table long after Dawn had gone upstairs to start her homework and begin the endless round of nightly phone calls, talking to girls she’d been talking to all day .

Spike not having time for Dawn. That was mega weird. Buffy would have bet anything she had that when it came to her little sister, the vampire was always completely reliable and trustworthy, strange as it was to use those words when talking about Spike.

It had to have something to do with Arabella. He’d been his usual annoying self until a couple of days ago. And that was just about the time Xander had seen Div’vid, Arabella’s husband in town.

Buffy pulled on a denim jacket, shouted up to Dawn that she was going to patrol and to go to bed on time and headed out for the cemetery that housed Spike’s crypt. She couldn’t shake off the feeling of uneasiness that flooded through her. She and Spike had been so - well, close, recently. OK, when it came to sex, together they were great. But that was all it was. Sex. She needed it, needed to feel, to be in contact in some way with life.

‘And you need a dead guy to get this contact!’ the cynical part of her brain added dryly.

So why was she worrying about Arabella being back in Sunnydale? She didn’t love Spike, she told herself firmly. So she couldn’t be jealous of the vampire girl. OK, at the party she’d felt jealousy, but that had been fuelled by too much pink champagne.

The cemetery was swirling with mists that curled in great white swathes around the tombstones. Buffy shivered. The denim jacket did little to keep out the cold.

There was hardly any vampire activity. One fledgling fighting its way out of a grave was dispatched without her even breaking her stride. And there was the crypt. Buffy hesitated, standing behind a large tree, gazing at the door. Should she try again? Talk to him again? Try to find out what the hell was going on.

Just then the door swung open and Buffy shrank back. She didn’t want Spike seeing her lurking like this. He had too good an opinion of himself as it was. Then she shuddered. Two figures stood in the doorway, back lit by candlelight coming from inside. Buffy peered through the mist. Spike should would recognise anywhere, at any time. And there other was -

A slim woman, long, curly brown hair caught up in a complicated knot at the back of her head. A pale blue top, very tight, clinging to her ample curves, and tight fitting black trousers tucked into leather boots. She looked elegant and sexy, immaculate and desirable.

Even as Buffy watched, the vampire girl reached up and kissed Spike on the cheek. Buffy felt her throat constrict and beads of cold sweat break out on her forehead as the man who had only recently been her lover ran his hand down his cousin’s throat, inside the collar of her top. Through the mist she could see they were both smiling, then Spike turned with a swirl of leather coat and strode off into the mist without a backward glance.

Arabella stood watching him, her hand on the door. She stood very still for a second, then turned her head and looked over her shoulder, directly at where Buffy stood.
“Miss Summers! That is you behind that tree, isn’t it? Were you coming to call on us? Would you like to come in?”

Buffy stepped out into full view, pushing her clenched fists tightly into her pockets. She’d promised she wouldn’t stake Spike’s cousin unless she was attacked first and she was determined to keep her word.

Arabella had said ‘call on us’. Did she mean she was living in the crypt? Buffy gritted her teeth and walked towards her. “Arabella. I thought you were in town. Australia not to your taste, then.”

“Miss Summers, may I call you Buffy?, such a very sweet, odd name. Oh, Australia was only a temporary visit. My husband had business back here. I imagine he is busy making money even as we speak.”

“I heard he was in town.”

Arabella spun round, for a second a startled expression crossing her beautiful face. “Div’vid in Sunnydale? Oh, I don’t think so.”

“Well, perhaps there’s more than one seven foot bright green demon around.”

Arabella laughed lightly and held the door of the crypt open. “Do come in, Buffy. The mist is getting thicker. I’m afraid it isn’t any warmer indoors, but then William and I don’t need heat - in any circumstance.”

Buffy walked past her, every nerve ending tingling, but determined not to show the girl she was annoying her.

“Can I offer you something? A fizzy drink, perhaps? I believe William does have a kettle and coffee, somewhere, but we’ve been feasting on - ”

“Spike doesn’t feast on humans any more!”

“Buffy, Buffy. Did I say humans? Feasting on some very tasty pig blood that he had in store. Personally, I’m not partial to the flavour, but William was keen for me to join him.”

“So - you’re staying here with Spike?” Buffy asked, gazing around the crypt, noting the female clothes scattered around, a purse upended casually on a stone coffin top, a pair of slippers with high heels and little pink feathers lying casually under a chair, as if Arabella had kicked them off to get comfortable.

“Of course. Where else would I stay. We’re family. I had the distinct impression that you were aware of that when we met at my anniversary party. I’m sure I explained to you that William and I have always been - close.”

“You made it quite clear that you were prepared to cheat on your husband with Spike, but he had no intention of doing so.”

Arabella laughed and lying back in the armchair, fondled the silver locket she was wearing. “I can hear from your voice that you are still feeling the teeniest bit jealous of me, Buffy.”

“Jealous? Of you and Spike? Don’t be ridiculous, Arabella. Spike’s a vampire. I’m the Slayer. We are - colleagues, I suppose. He helps out occasionally. But we certainly don’t have a relationship and as for jealousy - ”

Arabella pouted, her brilliant blue eyes shining in the candlelight. “Oh Buffy, what is the American expression? Can it? I am quite aware of your relationship with William. You want him and you have him if and when you get the chance. Listen, I don’t blame you, William is a very sexy man. Any girl would want him in her bed. And when you get that dreadful itch of desire, who better to scratch it than a vampire. But don’t confuse sex with love. William will never love you. Not like he loves me.
Buffy realised she was biting her lip so hard, blood was oozing into her mouth. Even as she watched, she saw Arabella react to the scent and for a split second, the girl vamped into game face and then back again, fighting for control.

“Oh is that how you keep him at your side, Slayer? You give him a taste of your blood? Do you let him have a little drink now and then, when he is - how did you put it? - helping you out!”

Buffy felt her stomach roll with a sick queasiness. God, if only she hadn’t promised Spike not to stake his cousin! One swift swing of her arm and the vampire girl would be just another drifting dust cloud. “And how would you keep him, Arabella? Do you think he would fight Div’vid for you? Spike likes your husband. Or hasn’t that occurred to you?”

Arabella stretched lazily, pushing her arms up above her head, the tight top and trousers clinging to her shape. The locket glittered in her cleavage and Buffy realised with a sinking heart that that was what Spike had been fingering when he said goodbye to her in the doorway - the smooth, creamy contours of her breasts.

Well, she thought, bitterly, Arabella was certainly better endowed in that area than she was. And she was only too well aware that Spike liked breasts. Loved to pillow his head on them, kiss and lick and -

She spun away and headed for the crypt door. She knew that if she stayed a moment longer, she’d break her word to Spike and kill his cousin, there where she sat.

“Don’t be sad, Buffy,” Arabella purred behind her. “You could never win, you know. Oh, I’m sure he enjoyed having sex with you. After all, all cats are grey in the dark, aren’t they? But I can give him Hope, and that’s all that matters to him.”

Buffy pushed out of the crypt and ran blindly back across the graveyard towards the road. Arabella’s words pounded in her head. ‘I can give him hope.’ That was what she’d said weeks ago at her anniversary party. But hope for what?

Love, I suppose, Buffy thought drearily. A future with another vampire, someone who would never grow old, decay and die. Someone who had the same tastes, the same inclinations, the same background.

But why was she so upset? There was something about Arabella that got under her skin. That air of complacency, of knowing you could make any man dance to your tune just by fluttering your eyelashes. No man would ever have walked away from Arabella, Buffy thought bitterly. Parker would have drooled over her. Riley wouldn’t have gone off to some god forsaken jungle if he’d had an affair with her.

She heard herself laughing - and it wasn’t a nice sound. She remembered Riley and his dark desire for lady vamps. Oh yes, he’d have thought Arabella was Christmas and Thanksgiving all rolled into one.

She halted at the end of the road and leant against a wall. All cats are grey in the dark. Oh god, was that what Spike thought about her? Had he had sex with her because there was no one else around? All the times he’d professed to love her, had that just been fluff and nonsense, words to get her on her back in bed?

Buffy took a deep breath, forcing the air into lungs that felt seared and burning. She refused to accept she was jealous. You had to have deep feelings to be jealous. And she didn’t have that sort of relationship with Spike. He was useful and - yes, she would give that to Arabella, he was sexy and made her feel good, but there was no affection, none.

No, it was Arabella who was upsetting her and she just needed to be indoors, somewhere quiet and calm so she could be still and work out why. “They’re welcome to each other!“ Buffy muttered as she reached Revello and ran up the porch steps. ‘If that’s what he wants in a woman, then great. It’s nothing to do with me. But he needn’t think he can come round to me for help when Div’vid comes hunting him!’

Two hours later she was still awake, sitting, gazing into space, trying to force her brain to stop painting pictures of Spike and Arabella together. When the phone rang, she almost jumped out of her skin, but picked it up swiftly. The last thing she wanted was Dawn to wake up and come downstairs. “Buffy Summers?”

“Yes.”

“Buffy, it’s Ross. Xander’s friend. At the Bronze. Remember?”

“What - oh, Ross, yes. What on earth are you doing calling now? It’s three in the morning!”

“Buffy, I’m sorry, but I don’t know if Xander told you or not. I’m a detective, Buffy, and I’ve got your friend Spike in my car. I found him breaking into the Magic Shop. I thought you should know.”

The inside of Ross’s car smelt of cigarette smoke and doughnuts. Buffy flung open the front passenger door and got in next to the good-looking guy she’d last seen at the Bronze. She turned and stared over the seat to where Spike was lounging in the back. His face was in shadow and he didn’t even say hello.

“Ross, hi! So you’re a detective! That’s a - surprise.” Buffy could hear her voice, sounding hideously bright and cheerful and completely unnatural. Although she did wonder exactly which tone would sound normal at nearly four in the morning when you’ve been summoned to bail out the guy who was once your worst enemy and closest lover. She didn’t think the etiquette book had been written that covered this situation.

“Buffy - ” Ross looked uneasy. “I’m sorry to call you, but this guy Spike - he won’t give me his surname - says he knows you and the owners of this shop with the weird name, The Magic Box. I was driving past on my way home from my shift and saw the door was open. He says you’ll vouch that he has permission to be in there in the middle of the night. He insisted I ring you. I didn’t want to drag him down town and do all the paperwork if that’s true.”

“Tell him it was OK for me to be in the sodding shop, Slayer,” Spike hissed and she could tell he was fighting vamping out. She had no idea how he’d managed to stay in human face when Ross caught him.

“Yes, Ross, it’s quite OK. I’ve no idea what Spike was doing there - but I expect it probably research for a - a project he’s helping my sister prepare for school. ”

“At three in the morning?”

Buffy heard herself laughing, carelessly, as if nothing mattered. “Oh, Spike suffers from dreadful insomnia, don’t you, Spike! He hardly sleeps at all.”

“Well - ” Ross shifted uneasily. “As he’s a friend of yours, Buffy, then perhaps, just this once - ”

Buffy slid out of the car, opened the rear door and half pulled the vampire out onto the sidewalk. “Yes, I quite understand. And thanks a million. Spike certainly won’t be bothering you again. In fact - ” she dug her elbow backwards and felt the vampire’s ribs creak under the power - “if I have my way he won’t be bothering anyone, ever again!”

Ross leant across as she slammed the door shut. “So, I’ll probably see you some time in the Bronze?”

“What? Oh yes, great. Can’t wait. I’ll ring you,” she chattered and waved happily as the car drove away.

“Right! You - inside!” she snapped and pushed Spike violently into the shop. She couldn’t remember when she’d last been so angry. He tried to pull away, but she grabbed him by the shoulders and flung him against the ladder that led up to the top gallery of the shop where all the books that were not for sale were kept.

“What the heck do you think you were doing, Spike? Breaking in here and nearly getting arrested! What if I hadn’t been there when Ross phoned? Were you going to kill him to get away? Or did you fancy ending up in a cell having your fingerprints taken. Waiting for the first ray of sunlight to come through the bars and finish you off! Have you gone completely insane?”

Spike rubbed his face with both hands. “Question, questions, questions. Look, thank you for coming to the rescue. I could have got the law to ring Anya, but I didn’t think she’d be quite so quick to arrive at this time of night.”

Buffy stared at him. “You still haven’t told me why on earth you needed to break into the Magic Box. Why not come up through the basement tunnels like you normally do when you want to steal something!”

“I wasn’t stealing anything,” Spike shot back, looking hurt.

“Then in words of one syllable, what were you doing here?”

“Doing has two syllables.”

“Spike! Don’t push me.”

He shot a glance at her pale, angry face, the green eyes dark with suppressed fury . He thought he’d never seen her look so beautiful, so desirable, so utterly pissed off with him before.

He’d known, without even thinking twice, that she would come to his rescue. That was odd in itself. How had he known that? He could so easily have hurt the young copper and escaped, but he’d even stopped himself from doing that because he knew the boy was a friend of hers.

“I’m still waiting for an explanation, Spike.”

He glanced away from her furious face. “I needed - more burba weed. Run out. Got a visitor, haven’t I? Arabella likes the hot taste of it in her blood as well as me. Family thing. Like you and Niblet liking popcorn.”

“And you needed to break into the Magic Box for that - in the middle of the night! Come on, Spike. Don’t treat me like an idiot. I thought we - well, I thought we trusted each other - just a little.”

There was a long silence broken when he said, his voice very low, “You know I trust you, Slayer. I love you.”

“So you‘re always telling me, Spike. But hey, can’t feel a lot of love in the air at the moment.”

“It’s - difficult. You’re the Slayer and Arabella said - ”

Buffy turned away, not wanting the hurt to show on her face. “Oh well, if Arabella told you not to tell me about the problem, that’s all right, isn’t it? Perhaps she can bail you out of gaol next time you get arrested!”

Spike stood up and reaching out, pulled Buffy round to face him. She glared defiantly into the burning blue eyes. “You sound jealous, pet.”

“What, of Arabella? God, Spike, haven’t we had this conversation before? At her house a few weeks ago? I will say it again, once and for all, I am not and never will be jealous of your skanky vamp cousin, so - ”

Her words were lost beneath his mouth as he kissed her. She tried to push him away, then realised her hands had linked themselves tightly around the back of his neck as he kiss deepened, growing more and more passionate.

She felt her body lighten as she rose on tiptoe, pressing herself against him, smiling even as they kissed at the response she was getting from his body.

His hands were roaming roughly across her skin under her top, and he was growling softly deep in his chest, as if he was a desperate man deprived of food and drink for too long.

The darkness of the shop seemed to be whirling round and round and Buffy felt herself slipping out of control. The old, familiar sensation of being swept away flooded over her. She felt her inhibitions vanish, all the ‘good girl’ behaviour that she paid lip service to in her waking moments was disappearing under a flood of feral desire that never ceased to stun and shock her.

Then, to her astonishment, she felt herself being pushed away. For the first time since they had becomes lovers, Spike was distancing himself from her, holding her at arm’s length, his face a frozen mask of pain. “I’m sorry, Buffy, I - I can’t, I mustn’t. I’m sorry.”

She felt a chill run through her body to the very bone. Every nerve in her frame was screaming at her to turn and run. She had been rejected too many times in the past, and here it was happening all over again. Obviously he was getting all the sex he needed from his cousin and now was feeling disloyal to Arabella by kissing Buffy.

She would never know what stopped her turning on her heel and running out of the shop. Pride? She didn’t think she had any left where Spike was concerned. Disbelief? Oh no, she was quite capable of believing that someone else could hurt her in this fashion.

No, she stood, swaying, waiting for the roaring in her ears to subside. All she could see in the dim light was Spike’s anguished face. This wasn’t a man who was keen to dump an unwanted girlfriend, this was someone who was fighting against what his mind and body were telling him to do.

“Spike - ” Her voice sounded odd - hoarse and rough. She reached out a hand towards him. “I know something’s terribly wrong. Please - I’m not trying to interfere. But let me help. You must let me help!”

Spike sank down onto the dusty floor and buried his head in his hands. He could have fought her if she’d been cutting or abrasive. But compassion, pity - he had no defences against those when the Slayer offered them to him.

“I broke into the Magic Box to find a book,” he said at last, lifting his head and looking directly into her eyes. “One of the old ones I know Giles used to keep up on the back shelves. I’ve seen it there a couple of times, but never thought I’d need it.”

“A book of spells?” Buffy asked incredulously.

“More like guidelines, I suppose. The means of finding certain paths, opening certain doorways.”

“But why? And why break in? You could just have asked Anya to get it for you.”

Spike shrugged, the leather of his duster creaking as he moved. “Buffy, have you ever been told a big secret - something so enormous, so wonderful, so bloody mind blowing that you can’t think straight?”

She winced. Did discovering that Angel was a vampire count? That Dawn was really green energy and not her sister? That she was deeply in love with a platinum blond - ”
“Yes.”

“Arabella’s been carrying a secret like that for over a hundred years.”

“I thought she’d have something to do with all this!” Buffy snapped. “You were fine till she appeared on the scene again.”

“You see, she was involved. She knew, but didn’t dare tell me. Didn’t see what I could do, so she kept quiet. She thought I’d die if I tried to change things and she - well, whatever you think, she cares for me, Buffy. I’m her cousin.”

‘And she wishes you were far more,’ Buffy said to herself but managed to stop the words from escaping her lips.

“Spike, you’re talking in riddles,” she said gently instead and sat down next to him on the floor. She took his hand and ran her thumb over the long slender fingers that could cause such havoc on her body. She could feel his body shaking.

“In all these years, you’ve never asked me about my father,” he said suddenly. “His name was William, too.”

Buffy bit her lip. Fathers were a sore subject in her life. “I suppose, well, you never mentioned him. I thought perhaps he died when you were small.”

“Or that I’d killed him when I was turned? Well, I would have done if he’d sodding been around. He was - well, he was - weak. He liked women. Hell, why am I poncing about with nice phrases. He liked sex, Buffy. Lots and lots of sex. He had women, a mistress.”

Buffy flinched. “Your mother - ”

“Oh she knew. He never kept it a secret. But in those Victorian days, nicely brought up women just accepted it and said nothing. Sex was what men did. They had animal urges, so their wives just turned away and didn’t see. Pretended they didn’t care. But I knew. And I hated him.”

Buffy felt his grasp tighten on her hand so hard that she wondered if the bones were going to crack.

“God, how I hated him! And I hated myself for not doing anything about it. I was a weak, stupid fool. Head in the clouds about my poetry. But I knew all about my father and his mistress.”

“What was her name?”

“Celeste. She was French. But she’s not important. Darla killed her.”

“What!”

Spike got to his feet and strode to the shop counter. He leant on it as if he could no longer stand up straight. He was speaking faster now, the words tumbling out.

“When Dru turned me, there was a killing spree. No good pretending it didn’t happen. It did. I’m not ashamed of it. Hey, we were vampires. It was what we did. I had no idea until later who’d died. I killed friends and relations I disliked. Dru feasted on my neighbours. Angel and Darla - well, my grandsire was too busy knocking the shit out of me to teach me manners to have the time to kill anyone, but Darla - oh she was always the one for tradition. If you got turned, then your family had to die. There had to be no one left who could weaken you.”

“But Celeste wasn’t your family. What about your father?”

Spike laughed bitterly. “Oh, he had the usual slice of luck that bastards such as him always have. He was away in Ireland on business when it all happened. When he got back - well, we’d all long gone. He never knew.”

Buffy was puzzled. “So, what’s the secret, Spike? What does Arabella know that you didn’t?“

Spike turned back to her. Buffy could sense the tension in his body. “Darla didn’t just kill Celeste. She got rid of Celeste’s child - my half-sister, Hope.”

“Your sister?” Buffy felt as though the ground was falling away from under her feet. “You had a sister?”

“Something else we share, Slayer. I only saw her once. She must have been about seven or eight, I suppose. I was horrified, stupid prat that I was. An illegitimate sister. What a disgrace! What shame. What would I do if my friends found out. If Cecily, the woman I loved discovered the truth. It sounds ridiculous now, but in those days, I can’t begin to tell you what that would have meant. So I never went to visit Hope. Had nothing to do with her. God, I’d have liked to have staked the person I was then.”

“Wait a minute, you said Darla ‘got rid’ of Hope. Are you telling me - she didn’t kill her?”

Spike spun round, his eyes blazing with blue fire. “Exactly! That’s the secret Arabella knew. Darla was apparently experimenting with all sorts of magic at that time for the Master. She wanted a victim, someone to play with. She chose Hope. She sent that innocent little girl into another bloody dimension. And Buffy, don’t you see, as far as Arabella knows, Hope could still be alive!”


to be continued


















 
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