Love Offering

The gentle, swaying motion of Spike carrying her lulled her into a sense of complacency that Buffy thought was beyond her since her return. Just having his arms cradling her brought her a sense of security and peace that had been out of her reach, achingly out of her grasp, and she embraced it fully, relaxing completely for the first time since she rose from her grave with bleeding knuckles.

Spike looked down at her and noticed that the pinched look around her eyes and mouth was smoothing out and the relaxed pose of her hands, one around his neck and the other resting on his chest. He hadn’t realized the Slayer was so tense until he felt her going loose and lax in his arms; it was only then that the full import of the evening hit him—she had given him his crumb, the one that he had longed for, and he was grasping it in his arms at this very moment. The realization nearly brought him to his knees.

He dropped down to the lower level of the crypt, absorbing the shock with the same weak knees that he thought were going to give out at any moment. He crossed the distance to the bed and placed her gently on the red velvet bedspread, then straightened to look at the feast before his eyes. Her hair had come loose from its utilitarian bun at some point and fanned around her head in a halo of golden light. The lace on her blouse framed her face in delicate ruffles of white and his heart, though unbeating, rose into his throat and choked him, bringing unbidden tears to his eyes. She was perfection personified, beauty unbridled, and it hurt at the same time that it thrilled him.

Spike was terrified that she would wake next to him in the morning and decide that this had been a mistake. He quailed at the thought of comparisons between him and Angel, or anyone else that she had been with—if she did, he wasn’t sure that he could take the blow to his ego or his heart. He loved her; he had forever, it seemed. Still, there was the doubt that resonated through his bones that he was no more than a replacement for a love that could never be. It vibrated his nerves with tension that must have communicated to her, because she opened her eyes to look up at him.

Buffy looked at him fully for the first time since their conversation upstairs and saw the fear that he had hidden so successfully for so long. She started to ask about it, then closed her mouth purposely, understanding flowing over her in a wave. There had been so much that was unspoken between them, so much they had to say to each other that had never been said, and she was the last one to question nerves or fear. She had it herself, in spades.

How could she ever measure up to the love of a hundred years? She could never be Drusilla—never match the strange draw of the dark, slinky vampiress that had held his heart in her hands for so long. She had little experience with men—one night with Angel and Parker apiece, a relationship with Riley that had been somewhat satisfying but left her wanting on so many levels. There were things that she wanted to explore that she was afraid were too dark for Riley and too kinky for anyone else—strange cravings for biting and pain that sometimes woke her gasping in the night, throbbing after dreams of sex and violence.

How could she tell him this? Would he still love her if she confessed a dark side? She wasn’t comfortable coming right out and asking him, so how do you go about telling things like that to a new lover? She had no idea how to go about it or what to do.

And now he was standing here next to the bed, looking as though he saw both pleasure and pain in front of him. She understood—God, how well she did—but there was little left that she could say right now. She couldn’t actually tell him she loved him; she had told him upstairs that she was in love with him, but love him? She didn’t know yet. She had pushed the feelings away for so long she wasn’t sure what she felt right now. She was like a blind man groping his way through a new place, floundering without direction or light.

She raised her hand and reached for him, and he took it, sitting down on the bed next to her supine form. “Spike, I…” she started, then the lump came up into her throat and stopped her voice as effectively as if it had been stolen outright.

He patted her hand. “You don’t have to say a word, pet. I understand. I’ll just—”

Buffy gripped his hand tightly as she felt his grip loosen. “No, you don’t understand. I—I don’t have much experience with…I mean, I’m not sure—God, I don’t know how to say this!”

His heart in his throat, he cleared it then said, “Just say whatever it is you need to say, Buffy.”

She looked down, unable to meet his eyes while she spoke. “I really don’t have much experience. I mean, Angel and I only had that one night, and you know that turned out craptastic. And Parker—well, one-night stand there. Riley…well, we…it was….” Her voice trailed off as she felt her cheeks growing hot with embarrassment.

Spike felt his heart sink like a stone when she mentioned Angel, but kept any expression off his face by sheer will. “I understand, pet.” He started to get up off the side of the bed and she pulled him back hard, inadvertently yanking him off-balance until he was lying halfway on top of her.

He held himself away from her with stiff arms. Buffy glared up at him, upset by the fact that he seemed to take everything the wrong way. “I don’t think that you do understand, Spike. I don’t think that you understand in the slightest.” Instead of waiting for him to misunderstand her some more, she pulled his head down to her and took his bottom lip between hers, pressing it gently with her teeth.

Spike groaned into her mouth and cupped his hands under her shoulders, drawing her closer to him. Buffy nibbled a path across his jaw to his throat and he buried his face in the golden silk of her hair. “What do you want from me, pet?” he asked hoarsely.

She sighed, her breath hot against his skin. “Everything. Sex and blood and violence. All the stuff that I’ve been too afraid to ask anyone else to do with me because they put me on a pedestal and you never did. I want you, Spike—along with all the stuff you told me that you were going to do to me on our wedding night that we never did get to. Is there anything else that I need to say?”

Spike took a deep breath of her, drawing her scent into his lungs. “Buffy, love…huh?” He pulled away far enough to look her in the eye. “Wedding night?”

“Yeah,” she said breathlessly. “You remember, the one we never got to have? Well, I want it…now,” she said, then pulled his head down to hers to meet his mouth with a fiery kiss full of unspent passion.

She tried to pour two years of longing into one sweet kiss; two years of denial, two years of frustration, two years of self-delusion, trying to forget the promised passion and failing miserably. She couldn’t tell him that she used him to measure everyone, even though they had never been intimate like this. She wouldn’t tell him how Riley had been lacking and she had longed for Spike's touch long before the big break-up. She could only pray that he felt the need inside her as much as she did.

Spike heard her heart racing and smelled her arousal as it wafted through the air. He felt her heart throbbing wildly against his chest and threw caution to the wind. “You do, do you? And what would you be talking about? What did I tell you that you want so bad?” He ran his hands over her face and down to cup her breasts over the lace of her shirt.

She buried her face in his throat. “I can’t say it out loud, Spike. You remember.”

Spike refused to let her hide any longer, from him or herself. “No, pet, if we’re gonna do this, we have to do it right. Honesty always—I don’t want anything less between us.” He nibbled at her throat. “What do you want more than anything, Buffy?” he whispered against her skin, sending a shiver down her spine.

“Oh God…I want you to bite me…I want you to show me…how good it can feel….” Her reply came out breathy and whisper-soft in the stillness of the cavern.

Spike pulled back to look down into her face. “That’s my girl,” he said, curling his tongue behind blunt teeth. He lowered his face to her throat, teasing the corded muscle and reveling in the flavor of her flesh. “Tell me more,” he commanded, his tone allowing no argument.

“Oh, God, Spike…I…I need to feel you against me. I need skin on my skin. I want to touch you. Please,” she begged, “Don’t make me think. Just…take me.”

His hands were busy at the front of her blouse, working the buttons free. He spread the loosened fabric open to reveal the satin and lace cups that concealed her breasts, then worked the front clasp to reveal her rosy skin to his gaze. Her nipples were already hard as diamonds, crinkling further in the cool air. He blew gently on them, grinning madly as they seemed to reach toward his pursed lips. “Buffy love, you’re beautiful,” he said reverently.

Without giving her a chance to respond, he covered her with his hands, feeling the heat rising from her body. Leaning on his elbows, he cupped a breast in each hand and supped the delicate piquancy of Slayer from each nipple in turn. Even her perspiration reeked with power, almost as much as he remembered slumbered in Slayer blood. Her soft sighing moans filled his ears as he teased her nipples with teeth and tongue and fingers, her body arching toward him to afford him better access to her delicious secrets.

Spike stroked her skin and pushed her shirt and bra off her shoulders, tossing them recklessly to the floor. Her hands dragged at his tee and yanked it over his head to join her clothing, leaving them both nude from the waist up. He was amazed at the satiny smoothness of her skin as he resumed his exploration of her body, touching her lightly and stroking her with questing fingertips as she stretched to increase the pressure of his caress.

Spike began kissing her again, letting the passion build slowly between them as he massaged her tongue with his, fully exploring the inner recesses of her mouth. She groaned deep in her throat, her hands reaching for his belt, and he grasped her wrists and drew them over her head, holding them firmly in place. “Bad Buffy,” he said with a chuckle. “We’ll take our time and do this right. None of this fast and furious for us tonight, love.”

Buffy looked up at him with her green-gold eyes. “Please, Spike. I need you,” she whimpered.

Spike nipped her earlobe before he replied by lowering his groin, allowing the full press of his erection to caress her thigh. “And I need you, love. I want this to be…memorable.”

He looked up in time to see Buffy roll her eyes. “I think that I’ll remember something this important, Spike,” she said, and he caught her other lobe between blunt teeth, working it gently until she was gasping for air. “All right, all right, you win,” she finally blurted out before he caught her mouth with his once again.

Need and desire set them both aflame as he touched her with his free hand. She allowed him to pin her wrists above her head with the other, letting him feel in control although they both knew it was a hold she could easily break. His mouth explored every inch of her exposed skin, marking it as his; his tongue was a brand that he used liberally to stroke and tease every minute part of her, from the curve of her shoulder to the sensitive bottoms of her breasts. When he buried his face in her armpit she tried to recoil in horror but he would have none of it. “Kitten, you smell so damn sweet all over I want to memorize your scent. Vampire, remember? I smell what lies beneath—the lust, the arousal, all of it.”

Buffy closed her eyes tightly in embarrassment. “But I’m all sweaty—” she started to say, and was surprised to hear him scoff openly.

“The sweetest scent, pet. Haven’t you ever learned about pheromones?” He looked amazed at the shake of her head. “A subject for another time.” He raised his head to look into her eyes. “Buffy, do you trust me?”

Buffy stared back at him for a long moment until he was nearly to the point of worry, then finally replied, “Yes.” Her voice was brimming with certainty he would not question.

Spike cupped her face with both hands, releasing her wrists to do so. “Then let me love you completely, pet.”

She raised her face and answered him with a kiss.

Spike moved off of her and left her chilly and bereft for a moment, until she realized that he was working the zipper on her skirt. Her fingers fumbled to assist him and together they got it undone. She raised her hips for him to slide it down over her legs, not realizing that he had raked her panties off with it until her buttocks slid on the satin coverlet beneath her. With a gasp, Buffy covered her pubic mound with both hands.

Smiling, Spike moved her hands to allow him full view of her body. “You are perfection, love. Never hide it from me.”

Buffy's lashes fluttered against her cheeks as he gazed on the deceptive perfection of her form. Small hands that held a stake so deadly to his kind; tiny feet that could down a raging vampire with a roundhouse kick—from head to toe she was a killing machine clothed in soft skin and womanly curves and he couldn’t help but want her, love her.

He stripped off his jeans and tossed them aside, his cock springing rampant and bobbing in the cool air. Her eyes fluttered open to look at him in turn and he was amazed to see the nearly fearful look that skittered through the windows of her soul. Almost belatedly he knew that it had been a long while since her last sexual experience, not counting the months that she’d been de—no, he wouldn’t think of that now. Never think of that when he had her there before him, eagerly waiting for his touch.

He stretched out next to her on the bed, his body barely brushing against hers. “So, pet, what do we do now?”

Buffy stared at the first naked man she had seen in what seemed like forever. He was muscle and sinew, wiry but never scrawny by any definition of the word. His alabaster skin gleamed in the candlelight with a borrowed golden glow and she could feel the desire curling in the pit of her stomach, ready to implode on itself. It had been so long since she felt another’s touch; she was more than ready for him.

Spike reached out to trail his finger from Buffy's collarbone down the center of her body to her navel. She caught his wrist in her hand and pulled him over on top of her to cover her body with his. At his look of surprise, she jerked one shoulder in half a shrug. “I was chilly,” she said, a calculating smile curling her mouth invitingly.

Spike raised himself up on his elbows to look down into her face. “You’re sure this is something you want, pet?” he asked, his cocksure attitude slipping away and leaving behind his insecurity in its stead.

Buffy reached up to cup his face with her palm, warm against his coolness. “I’m more than sure, Spike. Seems like all this time I’ve been trying to convince myself how wrong you were for me, but really? You may be the only one who’s right.”

She reached for him with her mouth and he met her halfway. Their tongues tangoed in a timeless dance of passion as her body arched into his of its own accord. Sparkles danced behind her closed lids as she felt his tongue scraping over her teeth and gums to explore every crevasse of her mouth. She raked her own tongue over the tiny slits in his gums where fangs would sprout when his demon emerged and felt rather than heard his groan as it rumbled through his chest.

Gasping for unneeded air, he tore his mouth from hers and reared back to stare down into her face, soft and slack with desire. “God, Buffy, do you realize what you do to me? I want you so bad, pet,” he murmured.

Buffy smiled up at him as she coiled her arms around his neck and toyed with the short curls at his nape. “Well, Spike, you can tell how much I want you. Do that smelly thing and you’ll know.”

Spike's mouth burned an icy path along her jaw to her earlobe. “Oh, I know, Slayer. Believe me, I know,” he said, nipping the lobe of the ear he whispered into. “I think that I’ll go and investigate the situation myself, though.”

Before she could respond he had slithered down her body to the soft brownish curls that were already damp with the juices of her desire. Leaning on his elbows and hovering above the apex of her thighs, he breathed her scent in deeply, relishing the mingled perfumes of his Slayer. Arousal, musk, perfume, it didn’t matter what anyone called it; it was the most elusively erotic aroma that had ever graced his nose. There was a hint of power in her essence along with something that was exclusively hers, and he knew that he could recognize that scent among a thousand women while blindfolded.

Spike was unable to resist the urge to swipe his tongue over the pungency to taste her and followed his urges, gratified by her gasp of surprise that was quickly followed by a moan of contentment. Her hand reached for his head and fisted in curls that were springing free of their everyday gelled prison as she arched her pelvis toward his seeking mouth, eager for him to begin his gustatory explorations. Instead of diving right in like his mind told him to do, he took his time, swiping his tongue over the damp curls and relishing the soft mewls of delight that were coming from the Slayer's mouth.

When her heart began racing in a staccato beat and her breathing became just as erratic, he dipped his tongue into the separation between her labia and into her dripping core. She squealed as her body listened to its own demands and he thrust his tongue once, twice, three times into her then swiped it upward to the pearlescent nubbin of flesh that was engorged and distended with her desire. Her legs fairly flew apart as she planted her feet flat on either side of his shoulders and thrust her clit against his mouth, trying to increase the pressure as she pulled and tugged on his hair to guide him closer. He grinned madly around her flesh as it covered his face, then gave her what she asked for, sucking her clit between his lips and flicking it quickly with the tip of his talented tongue.

She felt like she was flying and falling simultaneously. His mouth was both cool and hot, his tongue spearing her and raking over delicate nerve endings with exquisite tenderness and roughness at the same time. She tossed her head from side to side, begging for the release that remained teetering on the edge of consciousness and reason and came no closer. He sensed her need as she clenched and unclenched her fingers in his hair and finally crawled up her body slowly to hover above her.

Buffy cried out for him wordlessly, actual words lost to her in the flames of desire that consumed her. She opened her eyes to see him there above her, watching her face as she writhed in heat. “Spike, please—I need you,” she whispered. He dipped his head to shatter what was left of her composure with a heated kiss as he slipped inside her slowly.

Her eyes widened as he filled her, deeper than any other had ever been. She raised her head to look down at the place where they were joined together, their bodies made one. It was strangely erotic to see their pubic hair mingled in shades of shadowed browns in the dim light, his cock smooth and sculpted like marble as it delved deeper into her recesses, finally coming to rest inside her as he stilled. “Am I hurting you?” he asked, and she shook her head negatively, held mute by the sensations.

He cupped his hands under her shoulders and began to move slowly inside her. It was torturous to move that slowly—his gut wanted to pound into her and make her scream—but he wasn’t listening to his gut, only to his heart, and his heart told him to make this beautiful and make it last for her. All for her. He went slow, inching in and out as the gliding muscles gripped and tightened against him wetly. As sweat beaded on her brow and made his forehead slide from hers and land somewhere close to her throat.

Slow—as the world spun and changed around them with the import of their choice; as Sunnydale itself changed and the night dragged on inexorably; as a man tap-danced to his death and another sang until he burst into a flaming pillar of song; slow and sure as one day turned into the next and the next.

Spike scented her blood beneath the flushed skin of her neck in an offhand way, just another part of the womanly perfume that enticed him and excited him. The demon was far at the back of his mind now, for it was the man at the forefront, loving her with all his unbeating heart. She was the air for lungs that didn’t need air, the sunlight he had searched for to quench the shadows inside him, and the destiny that had eluded him for some one hundred years. She had been the driving force for his being for some time, but she became the reason for his unlife at that moment. He would spend the rest of his days to the ends of time itself to make her happy.

He shuddered against her and she smoothed her hands over his back, sensing the changes in him without words having to be spoken. Her thighs trembled and her stomach fluttered with the sensations he was arousing, but that seemed secondary now; her primary focus became the waves of adoration and adulation that rolled off of him and centered on her. She smoothed his hair and whispered comfort in his ear for his subconscious to absorb, for the man in him was too wrapped up in the realities he was allowing to surface.

Buffy wrapped her legs around his and held his body still inside her until his shaking ceased. He lifted his head and looked deep into her eyes and saw her peace and it brought tears unbidden to his own eyes, blurring the beauty before him. “God help me, Buffy, I love you,” he finally blurted out, and was surprised by her soft smile.

“I know, Spike. I love you. You’re my other half, you know?” She smoothed the moisture from his cheek with her hand and then wiped the tears from her own. “My Spike. My William. Love me?”

“With all my heart, Buffy.” His voice trembled with the emotion held deep for so long and she rewarded him with another blinding smile.

“Then show me how much.” She dug her heels into his calves and arched against him, flexing inner muscles around him and making him gasp. “Give it me good, Slayer of Slayers. Didn’t you tell me that once in an alley?” she teased, and was rewarded by a toothy smile from him.

“Yeah, but I also said that you were in love with death.”

She grimaced. “Not so much in love with death now. Been there, done that. Twice. So, not so much.”

He curled his tongue behind his teeth and arched his scarred brow. “Well, you do know the French call it le petit morte, right?”

Buffy frowned, trying to remember what little French she had learned in her sophomore year. “The…little death? What?” At his continued stare, her eyes widened at his wicked smile. “OH! Well, I guess we’ll have to see about that, won’t we?”

“Oh yes, we WILL see, missy,” he replied, and tweaked one of her pert nipples with thumb and forefinger. She gasped then moaned as he bent his head to capture it between his lips while moving his hips in tiny circles. His hips pressed her clit between their pubic bones as he moved, stoking fires inside her that had barely had time to die down. His body slid freely into the liquid silken sheath of her flesh as she arched and moaned against his arm, her fingernails raking his skin to urge him on faster, harder, but he kept his pace steady as he suckled her nipples. He reached down and cupped her ass in both hands, tipping her pelvis to afford him access to nerves deep inside her.

Her mouth o’ed at the first nudge of his cock against the deeply seated nerves, then she clenched her teeth against the scream that seemed to be building in her gut, refusing to let it out. She spiraled closer to the peak as he moved faster now, their bodies slapping together noisily as he drove himself deeper and deeper inside her writhing form. She pressed her forehead against his shoulder and gripped her bottom lip between her teeth, desperate to stifle the moans that threatened to erupt at any minute into pleas for release.

Spike sensed her closing in on her peak and redoubled his efforts. He didn’t hold himself back, for she was not a normal girl who would break beneath his onslaught. She was his equal in every way; that had been proven time and again in their years of acquaintance. He felt her bite into his bicep and his demon awakened, sensing her need, but he thrust it to the recesses of his mind and held it there by his will alone. He would not bring bloodplay into their first time together, no matter what the demon wanted. Instead, he gripped the slope of her shoulder between his own blunt teeth, increasing the pressure slowly until she was wild beneath him, biting and scratching.

Buffy stiffened, then her orgasm crashed over her in a wave of pleasure that took her by surprise. It rolled thunderously throughout her entire body from head to toe and back again, blinding and deafening her to her own voice as she begged, pleaded, and screamed for more. Her entire body clenched as a fist would and the second one was upon her before the first was complete; her entire consciousness centered on that one spot deep inside her being relentlessly pounded and molded by love into a sensitive mass of raw nerve endings.

Spike released the bit of flesh and muscle that he’d been gnawing on and watched the mindless bliss overtake her as she came, then was shocked as her second orgasm triggered his own, his come jetting inside her as his hips jerked spasmodically against hers. He rested his face in the crook of her neck, gasping for unneeded air and feeling her relax beneath his stillness. Her hands still grasped his arms, her face was still buried in his shoulder, but there was no urgency for him to move as they both came down off their natural high and back to the reality of life around them.

He felt her body quiver under him and leaned up on his elbows to look down into her laughing face. At his confused look, she smoothed his cheek and said, “I guess you were right, or the French were—it is a little death, isn’t it?”

Spike grinned. “Call Guinness—the Slayer thinks that I’m right about something.” They shared a laugh for a moment, then together fell silent as they both realized the import of their actions simultaneously. “We’ve really gone and cocked things up for you, haven’t we, pet?” he said, expecting her to jump up and run screaming from his crypt.

He was pleasantly surprised when Buffy shrugged. “You know what, Spike? I don’t care anymore. I used to wonder what they would all think if I…well, you know…and especially after Willow's spell, when I sat in your lap all that time and felt….” She clenched her inner muscles and gripped his softening cock. “But now? They all have girlfriends and people that care about them. Why not me too? Heck, I gave my life for them—and they dragged me back to here—so the least they can do is let me live the life they gave me, right?”

He rolled off of her and she leaned on his chest, her pointy chin digging a hole in him—but he wouldn’t ask her to move it for the world. “I can save the world a thousand times. I can slay vampires and demons until the cows come home. But if there isn’t a reason for me to do it, it kinda gets to be just a job. It makes my life just a job, and that isn’t living.” She traced patterns on his skin with her fingernail while she talked. “I learned a little since I died and came back. I need something to keep me here besides my sister and my friends and being the Slayer. I need someone to come home to and someone who will rub my back and make me feel important too. I hope that you’re that someone, you know? If you want to be.”

Spike felt his heart leap in his chest, though it still lay unbeating. “I would be honored to rub your tired feet, pet, but are you certain that I’m the one you want?”

She giggled. “After that? Oh, mister, you’re the only one that I want.” Her face grew serious. “You’re the only one that I’ve wanted for a long time. I just never could say it—not to you or to anyone else.”

“And can you now? Or will we be a dirty little secret?” He tried not to let his fear show, but he failed miserably and she could tell how much her answer would affect them both.

She cupped his cheek lovingly. “Can’t be a secret if you move into the house, can you? Unless you have some of those weird skills that Dracula is supposed to have—you know, with all the seeing, not-seeing stuff?”

He scoffed. “Gypsy parlor tricks, they are. Power of suggestion and all that. I don’t play those games, even though I am evil.”

“More like evil light…tastes great, less evil….” She collapsed on his chest, laughing uncontrollably. He looked down at her and waited for her giggles to pass.

Buffy looked up at him and saw the serious look on his face. “What?” she asked.

“You’re not kidding, are you?”

She saw the hope deep in his eyes. “Nope,” she said, popping the p. “Not kidding. I think that you moving in is exactly what I need. And I already know your bad habits—drinking blood, smoking too much, hogging the bed…so there’s no surprises there. Plus, it’ll be nice to have someone to come home and snuggle with.”

Spike listened to her making plans with half an ear as he let his heart soar. She not only loved him, but she wanted him to move into her house with her and her little sister, make a family with him. He vowed silently to do everything in his power to make her happy. It was the least that he could do.