Blood of My Blood
Chapter 5

AN: Wow, lots of updates recently now that I don’t have school to mess with me. And all things considered, I don’t think that’ll be a problem for awhile. So next I need to get working on my novels as well. Thanks to Patti for offering her beta skills. I’m always grateful for help making my stories better.



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Buffy, Spike, and Willow sat silently in the living room, glancing at each other uncomfortably then looking away again. Well, that was mostly the girls. Spike watched Buffy with occasional glances towards the redheaded intruder. He wanted her to go away before she ruined his plans for Buffy. He also wanted to be out of these uncomfortable clothes that his mate had forced him into again.

“So...” Buffy began, clapping her good leg on her knee. “What’re you doing here, Will?”

“You can’t act like that.” Willow waved a finger at her. “You can’t act like I’m just here on a social call and interrupting something—though, I so obviously was interrupting something!”

Buffy blushed bright red, causing Spike to growl softly.

“Yeah, well, we weren’t expecting visitors,” she said and sighed. “And you usually don’t make a habit of wandering through old mansions.”

“Didn’t you think we’d eventually come looking for you?” Willow asked, flinging out her hands.

“Actually? No,” Buffy admitted softly and looked down. “Especially when no one showed up immediately to check on me. I know Xander and Giles were less than thrilled with me for all the Angelus stuff. They blamed me for everything.”

The other girl was about to argue then bit her lip before saying, “I couldn’t come right away because I was in the hospital.”

“I knew you couldn’t, but no one-“

Willow cut Buffy off with a wave of her hand. “I know you weren’t meaning me specifically. But, anyway, in the hospital, they didn’t really tell me much and when I finally got out, I asked about you. They hadn’t heard from you and assumed you didn’t make it, even though you obviously stopped the apocalypse.”

“They just assumed I was dead and moved on?” Buffy asked incredulously, her voice filled with hurt. “Just because of everything with Angel they just wrote me off like that?”

“M-maybe they...really thought you had died?” Willow offered tentatively. She was just as flabbergasted by the behaviour of the male members of their group. “I mean, going up against three powerful vampires and Acathla?”

“Actually, I had help.” The Slayer glanced towards her vampire mate. “But, you guys didn’t know that. Although, that does lead me to things I didn’t know going into this battle...Something happened to Angelus before I dusted him. I almost dismissed it as a ploy to trick me.”

“Well, duh, that was me giving him his soul back,” Willow said as if she was stating the oh-so obvious. At Buffy’s clearly shocked look, the redhead questioned, “Didn’t you know I was doing it that night to help you?”

“No,” Buffy said barely above a whisper, shaking her head slowly.

“Um, well…” Her normally timid friend seemed even more uncomfortable, if that was possible. “He was supposed to tell you; Xander was...didn’t he?”

“No, he said your message was to ‘kick his ass’.” Buffy’s face was thunderous and her hands were balled into fists. “I can’t believe they had me go in there alone without knowing everything and blatantly lying to me. Then when I save the world, they just write me off! What, were they hoping the next slayer would be better since I was such a let down?!”

Willow cringed back into her seat. Spike was growling loudly, feeling distinctly all his mate’s hurt, anger, and disappointment. It made him mad and he wanted to protect her from everything, but he couldn’t. That just made him even more frustrated.

“Well, for what it’s worth, I did think their reaction was really odd...but I trusted them,” Willow finished weakly then swallowed. “But when another slayer didn’t come to replace you or Kendra—not even word of one being called—that’s when I got suspicious. And so, I came to check things out myself.”

“No, I wasn’t dead; I was just injured and at first I was being kept here by a vampire nursemaid,” Buffy said. “And then, after that, I just sort of figured no one cared if I came back and I was actually liking it here.”

“Here? With him?” Willow squeaked.

Spike gave an offended growl and shifted towards her. Buffy’s good arm shot out to block him before she gave him a look that softened his expression. In the next moment, he was snuggling against her side and causing Willow to be even more confused at the exchange. The Slayer hurried to explain—at least try to.

“See...Spike’s hasn’t just been taking care of me after I got the crap beat out of me and my arm broken, but I’ve been taking care of him. He’s feral, running around naked and acting weirder than usual.”

Buffy stopped, unsure if she could even tell her best friend about the claim thing. She decided to give Willow more time to react and adjust to everything first. If her friend continued to take it well, maybe Buffy could slip it in somewhere...find a way to break the news to her gently.

How do I break that kind of news gently? ‘Oh, sorry, you missed my wedding. Did I mention the groom was a feral vampire that runs around naked as a jaybird?’ Yeah, that sounds good.

“I just...I need to make sure he gets back to normal,” she continued. “Well, normal for Spike. He has no one else.”

“Buffy, that’s kind of the opposite of your job as a slayer,” Willow reminded her. “I mean, he’s an evil vampire who’s killed bunches of people and tried to kill you, too. And, once he’s better, how do you know he won’t return the favour by attacking you?”

Buffy looked at Spike slowly and met his gaze. “I just know, Will. Can you just trust me about this? I can’t tell you why...yet. I just know that things are different.” She finally looked back towards Willow. “I know that I’m not really the one to be asking for trust after the Angel stuff, but can you try?”

“I think the fact that I came looking for you proves I’m not holding some grudge over all the Angel stuff.” Willow gave her a small, nervous smile. “You didn’t know about the curse and you loved him...so it was complicated. I get that. Especially now that I sort of feel all those warm fuzzies for Oz.”

“Thank you.”

Tears welled up in Buffy’s eyes and her throat constricted. The little crumbs that Willow was giving her were huge to Buffy. It really meant a lot that she had at least one person on her side—besides a crazy, feral vampire.

And said vampire was growling softly, not in anger but confusion at his mate’s swirling emotions. He inched closer and nuzzled her shoulder to get her attention.

“It’s okay, Tarzan,” Buffy told him and swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. “I’m just a bit choked up. It’s nice to know I still have a friend.”

“Can you at least explain the Tarzan thing to me?” Willow wrinkled her forehead at them.

“Oh, heh.” Buffy lifted a shoulder. “I made a Tarzan joke and he took it too literally...I don’t think feral vampires get the point of humour much. So now he thinks it’s his name.”

They sat in silence again, back to being unsure of what to say. This time it was less uncomfortable with most of the explanations now out of the way. Buffy idly started running her hand over Spike’s wrist as she sat lost in thought. The action wasn’t missed by Willow, who chose not to say anything but to file it away for later.

“So...what are you going to do?” Willow finally asked.

Now the question was out there and Buffy couldn’t avoid it. Her eyes darted between her friend and her mate, thinking fast. Then she realized—in a way—she had already made this decision.

“Well, I’m obviously staying here until Spike is better. He needs me,” Buffy said thoughtfully. She turned back towards Willow. “But now that you know, I have some help...like not having to drag him with me if I need to buy something. Oh, and maybe you can get me food so Tarzan here can stop molesting the local population for take-out.”

Willow giggled. “He does what?”

“Well, he normally decides to forgo clothes...and he goes out to hunt.” Buffy made a motion with her hands. “And then comes home with some sort of fast food for me. So either he steals it or I so do not want to know where he keeps his wallet.”

That turned Willow’s giggles into full laughter. Spike knew he was the butt of the joke and started pouting, pushing away from Buffy as though he knew that it was all her fault. Mates were not supposed to mock you.

“Okay, in the interest of keeping down any increases in the general public’s therapy bills, I’ll swing by every day after school and bring you something.” Willow wrinkled her nose in thought and pointed at Spike. “He doesn’t kill does he? Should I bring him something of the bagged variety?”

“Um, he told me he doesn’t kill, so I assume he goes after animals when he leaves,” Buffy said with a shrug. “But if you can get something, that might be good. Just in case.”

With that decided for the moment, Willow stood up and nodded. “Okay, well, I should leave you to take care of Spike because he’s looking a bit upset. Either that or gassy.”

It did seem to Buffy like Spike didn’t look all that happy. After all this time with him, she weirdly felt able to read him well. She figured it might be a good time to try using the claim again and sent out her mystical feelers. Not much came back, but there was a bit of hurt. Later, she could feel elated at finally getting something.

Holding up a hand, Buffy suddenly remembered something.

“Hey, wait a minute, kay?” she said then dashed off down the hall.

Willow licked her lips nervously, continually glancing at Spike while Buffy remained out of the room. Buffy had been the person to keep the vampire from trying anything and now the little geek was left alone with him. But in no time, Buffy came bounding back into the room waving something in her hand.

“Money, I got money. I wouldn’t expect you to be able to feed us on your allowance and all,” Buffy explained, shoving into Willow’s hand the roll of money she had found in Angel’s drawer. “That should cover food for a long while and hopefully Spike will be back to being Spike before it runs out.”

“He didn’t steal this, too, did he?” Willow asked.

“Oh, no.” Buffy waved a hand dismissively. “I’ve been raiding the vampires’ stuff. I mean, Angel and Dru are totally dust and so everything they had is up for grabs including Angel’s money. Dru didn’t have any because ‘hello’ insane! As for Spike’s stuff, I’m hoping he’ll understand I’m using his money to take care of him.”

“So Angel and Dru...gone?”

Both girls were sort of surprised to find that they had skipped that question up to then.

“I dusted Angel, and it drove Dru crazier than usual. Spike stopped her, but only after she gave me a good beating that included breaking my arm and running a sword into my gut.” Buffy stopped when Spike was suddenly next to her, obviously having sensed her thoughts of the horrible night. She touched his arm when it went to snake around her protectively. “Spike dusted her and I must have passed out, but when I came to he was like this. Well, worse than this, because he’s kind of gotten better.”

“And that’s all this is? You playing nursemaid to each other?” Willow’s eyes were a little too knowing.

Buffy looked at her, trying to figure out how Willow might feel about a possible Buffy-and-Spike. There was no judgment there and she felt relieved, but still couldn’t bring herself to mention the claim. That would force her to deal with it more than she was willing to yet.

“I’m not even sure what it is any more.” It was the most truthful thing Buffy could tell her friend.

Willow nodded. “And I assume you don’t want me telling the others. I don’t think they’d take it as well and would come here to stake him. Not that they would ask, since they seem to have already made up their minds about what happened to you.”

“Thank you, Willow. Thank you so much.”

Buffy was sure she was about to tear up again, but her friend just gave her a quick hug before leaving. If Buffy started crying, then Willow would start crying, and poor confused Spike would have two crying females on his hands. So it was best that Willow take off quickly.

As soon as the other girl was out of sight, Buffy turned back towards Spike. She gave him a soft smile then walked past him towards her room. Their room. As she was reaching the door, though, he moved into her way with a firm set to his mouth.

“Buffy and friend laughed at Tarzan.” His full bottom lip was sticking out and her eyes were glued to it against her will.

“I’m really sorry it hurt your feelings. We were just kidding.” She reached out to touch his cheek. “How can I make it up to you?”

At first, she didn’t realize how her question could lead to badness. Even as he stood there thinking about it, the thought didn’t click of what he might ask for. Then he got that very Spike-ish grin and it finally sank in, making her curse herself for not thinking before speaking.

“Tarzan want mate.”

Spike pulled Buffy into the room then gave her a push towards the bed so that she fell with a plop when the backs of her knees hit the mattress. Her eyes got wide as she watched him prowl across the room towards her, dropping clothes as he went. Then he was before her, gloriously nude while she was frozen in a trance.

“Buffy touch Tarzan.” His voice floated down to her from somewhere far away.

Her head jerked up to look at him. When she didn’t do what he had been wanting, he made an impatient sound and took her hand, placing it on his rigid cock. He groaned and thrust into her hand before moving her hand in an obvious motion, showing her what he wanted.

“Ohh...” she breathed softly and swallowed hard.

Eventually Spike dropped his hand, allowing hers to keep up the stroking. His head dropped forward and he watched her through hooded eyes, shifting his gaze between her hand and her face.

She glanced up to meet his eyes for a moment and her tongue darted out to wet her lips. This was...incredibly weird, but hot. Very hot. Her hand picked up the pace as her shock wore off completely and he began moaning louder.

Then the walls seemed to come crashing down, pleasure flooding over the claim so that she nearly fainted from the sheer force of it. He had been holding back or the demon had. Either way, it was open and she was ready to cum right along with him. Her moans matched his and her hand tightened around his shaft.

A choked sound was Buffy’s only warning before Spike came over her hand and arm. He had tried to verbalized his orgasm, but found it difficult in this state. She closed her eyes, taking deep breaths in the aftermath and needing a moment before facing him again.

“Buffy?” His hands were on her face as he knelt before her and she opened her eyes to give him a weak smile. “Buffy good. Tarzan liked a lot.”

Laughing softly, she leaned forward to kiss his nose. “It doesn’t take much to please you, huh?”

Spike didn’t pick up on her mirth, but dipped his head towards the smell he caught coming from between her legs. “Buffy...”

“No,” she said quickly, cutting him off and turning her legs away. “It was just...the claim. Something happened and the claim went all funny.”

He tilted his head, much like a dog.

She sighed and brought her hand up to run through her hair, before realizing her one good hand was still covered in-

“Oh, gross!” she exclaimed, holding her hand away and eyeing the hair that was now stuck to her fingers. “Great! Now I need another bath!”