Buffy swore softly under her breath as she hit the back space key -- again -- deleting her latest error from Riley's computer screen. "I *really* wish I'd paid more attention in typing class back in high school," she muttered, frustrated by her own failure.

"Can't see as how it'd have held your interest," Spike shrugged. "You're more about action than words. Always have been, pet."

There was a gentle affection in his quiet voice, an admiration that reminded her that there were other areas in which she was more than talented enough to make up for her lack of computer skills. Again, she marveled at how Spike always seemed to know how to make her feel better.

If only she could make *him* feel better.

In spite of his light tone, his gentle teasing with her, his voice was still strained, revealing the anxiety and fear he was still struggling with. He was trying to trust her, to believe that her plan would work, but his eyes were still anxious and uncertain, as he looked over her shoulder to study the document that was slowly, painstakingly coming together on the screen.

After a minute which included about a half dozen more backspaces, three more soft curses of frustration from the slayer, and a kick to the hard drive -- fortunately *without* the force of her Slayer strength -- Spike spoke hesitantly. "If you'd like, I -- I could give it a try, love."

She looked up at him in surprise. "You know how to use a computer?"

The look he gave her was surprised, and a little offended. "Bloody right I do," he replied, a bit defensively. "I did actually *live* through the past fifty years or so, pet...well, in a manner of speaking." He shrugged, glancing up at her with a question in his eyes.

“So did I,” she pointed out dubiously, looking away from him and back to the screen. Then, suddenly, she stood up, pushing her chair back and stepping away from the frustrating equipment. "Okay," she relented. "Go ahead. You *have* to be better at it than I am, because I suck!"

The fact that her usually quick-to-compliment, eager-to-please vampire did not argue with her assessment of her typing skills told her just how bad they really were. As Spike took her seat at the desk and immediately picked up where she had left off, long graceful fingers played over the keys with such skill and accuracy that she found herself awed -- and a little annoyed.

He glanced up to see her watching him, noticing the expression on her face, and then quickly refocused his attention on the screen in front of him -- but not before a small smile turned the corners of his mouth up a little. He was clearly pleased with himself.

"Show off," she muttered, but her tone was good-natured, as she turned to pick up the file folder she had left on top of the filing cabinet.

While Spike worked on the new document they were making, she went to Riley's copy machine and made copies of all the information from the personnel file that she thought would be useful to them. She intended to leave the originals; Riley would certainly know that they had seen or taken *something* from his office – he wasn’t *that* stupid – but she did not intend to make it easy for him to figure out.

She was just carefully replacing the folder in the file cabinet, being sure to leave it exactly as she had found it, when she felt, rather than saw, Spike's approach from behind her. She was getting better at sensing him, she realized with a pleased smile. She turned to face him, her eyes widening in surprise when she saw the completed document he was proudly holding up for her inspection.

"You're done already?" she said incredulously, taking it from his hand and walking back toward the desk to compare it with the handwritten original they had quickly composed on a piece of scratch paper.

It was word for word perfect, and looked every bit as official as the signed ownership papers that they had found on Riley's desk. She laid the paper down carefully on the desk, then took the copies she had made and folded them, putting them in the outside pocket of her suitcase and zipping it closed. Then, satisfied that all evidence of their activities had been concealed, she turned her full attention back to Spike with an appreciative, admiring smile.

"You are incredible, you know that?" she told him, her voice soft and affectionate as she slowly stepped toward him.

He looked down with a shy sort of smile, clearly pleased with himself, but still not used to accepting praise or positive affirmation from a human.

She was going to change that.

"You are so awesome, I could just..." Her voice trailed off, her eyes sparkling as she shrugged, "Why not?" she mused, her eyes sparkling as she leaned in to kiss him.

He felt a rush of warmth flow through him at the combination of her kiss, and her words, which filled him with a sense of pride and security that he had all but lost long ago. Buffy had no idea how much such a simple thing could mean to him; she had no idea how long it had been since anyone had appreciated any good thing he had done.

But to Spike – it was life-changing, almost beyond belief, to be treated with the gentleness and affection she had been lavishing on him lately.

He gratefully, enthusiastically returned her kiss, pushing forward until her hips hit the side of the tall desk, and she leaned back against it for support, pulling out of the kiss for a moment, breathless, as his hands began to rove slowly over her body, coming to rest on her hips and pulling her gently closer to him.

"God!" she gasped, feeling every individual tiny point of contact between his body and hers, every sensation intensified by the desperate need for him that his touch was awakening, catching her by surprise. But – they were still in Riley’s office, and they had to be ready for him when he got back. "Spike...we...can't..."

"Got to," he muttered, and the sound of his voice, low and longing, only intensified the desire she was trying to control. The cautious reverence in his manner was giving way to an intense yearning for her, a determination to have her, and that realization sent a rush of desire straight through her very core, as his mouth lowered to her throat, sucking gently on the soft skin directly above her pulse.

“Need you, Buffy,” he whispered, the light touch of his cool breath against her skin driving her wild with her own need. “Need you so much…”

“We can’t…” she tried again – failing utterly, as her body betrayed her mind. “*God* -- I want you!” she gasped, the voice of reason in her mind that had been insisting that this was a very bad idea, suddenly very confused, and very interesting in finding out for itself.

One of his hands slid down to stroke with a teasingly soft touch across the front of her jeans, while the other reached behind her head to rest at the back of her neck, pulling her throat closer to his mouth, his blunt human teeth nipping lightly at her throat before caressing it with feather-light kisses.

There was such a primally possessive feeling to the way he was touching her, it took her breath away. The Slayer in her recognized the passionate need that drove him, not only to *be* possessed, as he had been for so long, both willingly and unwillingly – but to possess, to *have* her completely.

That same part of her was warning her to flee – here was the danger she was supposed to destroy wherever she found it, and to escape if she could not destroy it – but certainly never to allow to get so near, to touch her like this until her senses were on fire and she was past the point where resistance was even an option.

The Slayer in her realized that if Spike had wanted to kill her in that moment – she would have been dead.

But despite the natural sense of danger that just seemed to come with the territory, another part of her, another need equally primal and ancient, cried out for him to take her – own her – make her his and his alone.

He wanted her – wanted to claim her as his own, then and there. Every sense he possessed told him that she would not try to stop him, that she would consent, that she wanted him to do it. But his basic instincts that told him to go ahead and do it were locked in battle with the conditioning of pain and humiliation that told him that he did not dare so such a thing to a human woman, his mistress. Only suffering could follow such an action.

*Mine,* his innermost being cried out, with a ferocious need, absolutely desperate for her – and he did not realize that he had actually growled out the word aloud, in a passionately possessive whisper, until he heard her little gasp of shock at the sound of it.

Her shock was mostly at the overwhelming desire that the single word had awakened in her – to *be* his – to have him claim her with more than his words. Her subconscious had realized that that was where they were headed, but until that moment she had not realized how badly she wanted it.

Spike completely misunderstood.

As quickly as the moment had come upon them, the spell was broken, as he drew back from her suddenly in alarm, his eyes wide and apprehensive as he took several steps back away from her, shaking his head slightly.

An actual attempt at biting a human, let alone anything even resembling a claim, was considered to be the worst offense that a slave could possibly commit. And although he had not actually tried to bite her, his training and conditioning told him that at this point, all he could expect in response to the simple whispered word was brutal punishment.

He knew that Buffy would not hurt him – but still, the memory of the things that had been so deeply instilled in him in the training center made the entire situation confusing and frightening for him. He was sure that at the very least, she would be very angry with him for his presumption.

*How could you let yourself lose control like that, you stupid git?* he chided himself frantically, dropping his gaze and retreating a few steps further, as Buffy stepped cautiously toward him.

His voice was soft and hesitant as he finally found the nerve to speak. “I – I didn’t mean to…I – I’m sorry, Buffy, I…”

“No,” she interrupted him, her voice still breathless from the power of the broken moment, but her eyes full of concern as they searched his face.

She wasn’t sure exactly what was causing this reaction, but she was willing to bet it had something to do with the threat of his “training”, so much more prominent in his mind at the moment due to the papers they had found, evidence of Riley’s cruel intentions to return him there.

More than anything, she wanted to be able to ease his fears, to make him trust that he was safe. “No, don’t be sorry. I…” She paused, seeking the right words – not exactly finding them. “I…didn’t mind.”

She had almost said so much more, and did not really understand why she changed the words in her mind before allowing them out of her mouth. To say that she “didn’t mind” had to be the understatement of the century. But the Slayer in her, that part of her that had to be in control, was terrified to surrender that control to any vampire, even if it was Spike, just could not admit – not yet – just how desperately she had *wanted* the claim he had almost completed.

Unaware of her internal conflict, Spike went on in a soft, desperately insistent voice, “I – I didn’t mean it like that, Buffy.” He was sure that even if she *did* see him as a free person now, he had certainly overstepped the boundaries of their relationship. “I – I…”

“Yes,” Buffy interrupted firmly, her eyes gentle but serious as he finally raised his own wide, startlingly blue eyes to meet her gaze. “You *did* mean it like that.” She *wanted* him to mean it like that.

Before she could go on, he once again misunderstood her words, misreading her serious tone for an accusation, and replied immediately, his voice trembling, “I’m sorry…Buffy, I’m sorry…”

She frowned, frustrated that it was so difficult to break through the false ideas that had been so firmly planted in his mind by the brutality he had experienced. At first she blamed herself for the wrong words, but she was beginning to think that it would not matter what words she chose – Spike was determined to make himself at fault for this.

And there was not even any “fault” to be had.

“Spike,” she tried again, a gentle urgency in her voice, as she closed the distance between them, reaching out to put her hands firmly on his arms.

Instinctively he tried to pull away, feeling trapped and self-conscious, aware from her tone and her expression that she at least partly knew the demons of his past that he was struggling with, and that knowledge making him feel exposed and vulnerable.

“Buffy,” he whispered, shaking his head, trying to pull away, unable to resist much against her superior strength. “Buffy, don’t…”

“Spike, listen to me!” she insisted, her voice a bit more forceful than she had intended, cringing inwardly when he flinched. *There you go, Buffy,* she thought with harsh sarcasm. *Why don’t you freak out the vampire with post-traumatic stress disorder just a *little* bit more?*

“*Buffy*?”

The familiar voice from the doorway immediately drew their attention from the personal situation they were dealing with, to the uncertain, questioning face of the man framed in the doorway, looking for all the world like a very confused, completely non-threatening ordinary guy, although perhaps a bit surprised at the presence of his soon-to-be ex-wife and her slave in his office.

He looked nothing like the absolute monster that both of them knew him to be.

“Riley!” Buffy said in a surprised tone, a falsely pleasant smile on her lips, her attention still mostly focused on Spike, despite her husband’s arrival. “Hi.” Riley seemed determined to maintain the façade of normalcy for the moment, so she did not think he was an immediate threat – and soon he would be no threat at all.

Spike, apparently, disagreed.

At Riley’s appearance, already shaken up from the events that had been taking place between him and Buffy before the soldier’s entrance, flinched back a little with a little gasp of fear, wild, pleading eyes falling on Buffy, begging her wordlessly for her protection, protection that, at the moment, he did not think she would want to give him.

*Okay,* Buffy thought. *Gotta get this under control, *now*!*

“Spike,” she said, her voice low and firm, moving in close to him, so that only he would hear her whispered words, “Calm down. It’s okay. I need you with me on this, okay?”

He nodded, his eyes wide and panicked as they focused on hers. “Okay,” he whispered. “Please – please, Buffy, don’t let…”

“Spike,” she repeated slowly, warning him before he could say or do anything to give them away, and he was immediately silent. “I promise,” she reminded him in a whisper.

When he nodded his response, she looked at him for a moment longer, until she was satisfied that he was back in control enough to help her. Their personal issues could be dealt with at home, later. Right now, she had an evil ex-husband to deal with.

She turned to face Riley with a bright, disarming smile as she stepped casually toward him, carefully staying between him and Spike. This was it, she thought with determination. Spike’s future safety, future presence in her life, was dependent on what she did now – and although she knew she was about to cross a line, there would be no turning back.

*This is it,* she thought. *Showtime.*