Chapter 4

Buffy woke up in a strange bed. She blinked at burgundy satin sheets for a moment, then memory came back and she smiled. She stretched luxuriously, brushing against a cool, strong body behind her, then rolled over. Spike was watching her, leaning his head on one bent arm. His face was very still, expressionless except for the tiny frown in his eyes and the tension in his faintly compressed lips.

"Have you been watching me all this time?" she asked.

"Pretty much."

Spike hadn't let himself sleep, hadn't wanted to lose a moment of this. Her body relaxed and compliant against his, the softness of her hair against his face, the scents of their two bodies intermingled with the scent of sex, her face calm and sweet not angry and upset, surrendered to him. It was too precious to miss a moment of it. He cherished every second, stored it up in his memory, not knowing how long it would be until it was only a memory, not knowing how long he would be permitted the reality.

He watched her now tensely as she blinked out of sleep, braced for the moment when he would lose it all.

"I wish I'd stayed awake," she said.

"Why?"

Buffy smiled. "Could have watched you."

His eyes widened.

She rolled completely over to face him, snuggled into him, sighing with content, her face in his throat. "Mmm. You feel so good."

He made an odd, little sound against her hair, a wordless catch of breath, involuntary and astonished. She drew her head back to look at him.

"What is it?"

"Nothing. Surprised, is all."

She realized suddenly that he had been expecting rejection. Was that because of the other reality's Buffy? Was that what that Buffy had done? She honestly couldn't understand why.

She pulled his face to hers and kissed him. He shuddered in her arms, then all the tension ran out of him and he relaxed against her, his body fitting to hers and his arms holding her close.

"Buffy," he whispered. "Buffy."

They kissed slowly, luxuriously, relishing the moment.

"Is it always like this?" she murmured. "So... perfect."

"What?"

"Making love."

"Oh, pet." He leaned his forehead against hers, his eyes closed. "Only with you. Only with you."

She smiled in triumph, ran her hands over his back. "What time is it?"

"About eight."

She sighed. "Not enough time. Mom will be expecting us for dinner."

"Not enough time for what?"

"What do you think?"

He grinned suddenly, his tongue curling behind his teeth. "Always time for a quickie. Could get you off in five minutes. Want me to show you?"

She laughed. "Nuh-uh. Want to take my time. Want to explore. You said I could later."

His breath left him in a little hiss. "Anything you want, luv."

She reached up and pulled a strand of his hair onto his forehead, studied the arrangement with interest. "Bed hair. I like it."

"Are you trying to change the subject?"

"Is it working?" She grinned at him. "We've only got ten minutes and then we've got to get ready to go because otherwise we'll be way late and Mom will start asking questions. And then we've got patrol. But after that, I don't have to be back till two or three in the morning because it's Saturday. So we'll have hours."

He was grinning too. "The way you think has potential. But what do we do with these ten minutes?"

"Cuddle?" She snuggled into him, wrapping her arms around him. "Do you mind? I've heard that guys don't like to do that."

He dropped his face into the curve of her shoulder and said nothing for a long moment. "This guy ... likes it."

They lay there for a while, just enjoying the feel of each other's bodies, lips brushing, hands lightly stroking each other, keeping a low simmer of slow, sweet, lingering sensuality going but not taking it higher. Finally Buffy drew back, sighing regretfully.

"I've got to take a shower."

"Could join you," he murmured. "Save time and water. That's a good thing, right?"

She laughed. "We wouldn't save anything. We wouldn't get out of there for an hour."

She reached for his T-shirt and pulled it on, still a little embarrassed at walking around naked in front of him. He lay watching her, one knee bent and the sheet at the bottom of the bed, naked and beautiful as the dawn and not embarrassed in the slightest. Her gaze ran over him with pleasure.

"Knew I should have gotten a tub," he remarked as she stepped into the shower. "Got the shower for speed and efficiency. But now I think maybe a Jacuzzi tub, yeah? They've got some big enough for two."

"I think the shower will give you ideas enough," she muttered and he laughed.

Once he had taken a shower himself and she had forced him reluctantly into his clothes, they headed back to Revello Drive. He turned out to be a handholder, she found as they walked along, hands comfortably interlinked. He was very tactile, brushing her hair, stroking her arm or her back lightly with his fingertips, constantly and unconsciously touching her. She liked it.

"You're late," Joyce said when they walked in.

"Had a lot to do. And there's...still a lot to be done," Buffy added, with a glinting look of promise at Spike. "We'll be going back after patrol."

"Well, don't be too late getting home, dear," said an unsuspecting Joyce.

"Of course."

Joyce might be unsuspecting, but she was a mother after all and soon realized that something had changed in the dynamic between the two. The talk and the laughter during dinner was exactly the same as it had always been, but there was an intimacy and a warmth in their voices and glances that hadn't been there before and they were both eating onehandedly. Buffy's left arm and Spike's right both hung straight down at their sides and Joyce didn't have to look under the table to know that they were holding hands.

‘Oh, dear,' she thought. A vampire was not what she wanted for her daughter. She wanted Buffy to have a settled life and kids and everything a normal woman should have. Then she thought of what Giles had told her about Slayers, the awful statistic that most Slayers died before they were twenty. Maybe it was right that Buffy should seize the day, find as much happiness as she could before the inevitable.

‘Dust before I let anything hurt her,' Joyce remembered Spike saying. She glanced at him and caught the look of utter devotion in his eyes as he watched Buffy. ‘Well, there were worse things,' she thought. ‘At least he can't get her pregnant.' She had learned that from Rupert Giles' books.

Buffy's cell phone rang just as they were starting to get up from the table.

"Oh, hi, Willow...Oh, really! Sounds like it's moving right along. Give me a moment to get upstairs." Buffy leaned over confidentially to Spike. "You were right about Oz. Girl talk. Ten minutes. Okay?"

He looked amused and nodded.

"Oz?" Joyce asked as Buffy ran upstairs.

"Guy who seems to like Willow."

"Well, good. I never thought Xander gave her the attention she deserves. Or any at all. Would you like a drink? I feel like one, but I don't like to drink alone and you're certainly old enough."

"Yeah, I'm old enough," he grinned. "Thirty year old Glenfiddich!" he exclaimed as she poured him a glass, then set the bottle on the table. "Where did you get that, Joyce?"

"Rupert Giles brought it over. A friend in England sent him some and he knows I like Scotch."

"Been a long time," he said, sipping at it with appreciation. "Felt like celebrating tonight."

"What are you celebrating?"

He jumped a little. "Oh, just having a good day, is all."

Something hit the open back door with a crash: Angel, finding out face first that he had forgotten that he had yet to be invited into this house and smashing into the invisible barrier. Joyce leaped to her feet with a shriek.

"Oh, balls," muttered Spike under his breath and got to his feet himself.

"Joyce, let me in!" Angel was yelling. "That's Spike! He's dangerous!"

"Who are you?" Joyce was stammering. "I don't know you!"

"I'm Angel! Buffy's boyfriend! Spike, tell her!"

"Like I would," Spike muttered.

"But I thought you were Buffy's boyfriend," Joyce said under Angel's yelling about how Spike was a vampire and dangerous.

Spike's lips tightened. "Told you. I don't know what I am."

"Joyce, let me in!" Angel was shouting. "You're not safe with him!"

"I am safe with him," Joyce retorted. "He has never hurt me. I know him. I don't know you."

The time that this had happened in the other reality, Spike had enjoyed himself, laughing and clowning and pretending to bite Joyce. This time he was not enjoying it one bit. Buffy and he had made love, yes, but he didn't know whether he meant any more to her than just good sex. He had wanted just a little more time for her to get used to being with him, hadn't wanted anything to remind her of Angel. And here Angel was, banging on her door, inevitably destroying everything Spike had hoped for.

"Is he her boyfriend?" Joyce asked as Angel raged and shouted outside.

It hurt him to say so, but: "I guess so," he admitted. "But don't you let him in. That should be up to Buffy to decide."

"What the hell's going on?" demanded Buffy, storming into the kitchen. Then she stopped short. "Angel."

She gave Spike an unreadable look.

"Doesn't like my being here," said Spike simply.

"I see. Angel, stop it. Spike's welcome here."

"What's wrong with you, Buffy?" Angel demanded. "Why did you let him in? He's one of the most dangerous vampires around..."

"So are you, Angel."

"I'm different! I..."

"He's a vampire too?" Joyce asked Spike.

He nodded. "Yeah, but he's also got a soul, just like me."

"You don't have a soul," spat Angel. "You just say you do."

"I'm going on patrol," Buffy interrupted. "Come with me, Angel. Bye, Mom. See you later, Spike."

"Well, there was a dismissal if ever I saw one," said Spike under his breath as Angel gave him a triumphant look and stalked after Buffy.

"I'm sure she didn't mean it that way," said Joyce, looking after Buffy and Angel worriedly. "I don't like her going with him. Will she be safe?"

"Oh, he won't hurt her physically. Emotionally is something else. He's an assho...sorry, Joyce, a ponce. Don't worry. I'm going after them. Not gonna let Buffy do a patrol without me for backup."

He didn't trust Angel to be as protective of her as he was.

"Don't let him in without Buffy's sayso," he said quietly to Joyce and she nodded. He downed the rest of his Glenfiddich in one gulp (which was a sacrilege, but he needed the liquid courage right now, his heart felt so heavy), then slipped silently out of the house and ghosted after them.

He stayed far enough back that they wouldn't sense his presence, but close enough to be able to see them and any threat that might appear. Angel was a good fighter, as he had cause to know, but he didn't like the way Angel seemed to think that all the threats of the Hellmouth were Buffy's to deal with alone. He couldn't help remembering Parent-Teacher night in the other reality, for only one instance.

Spike was dangerous. Angel had that right. Spike was deadly and lethal and he had meant to kill Buffy that night. But Angel had run out of the school to fight the lesser threat of the fledglings outside, leaving Buffy and her Mum to Spike's mercies inside. And Spike would have killed Buffy if Joyce hadn't hit him with that fire axe. He had won that fight and his fangs had been at Buffy's neck. Some protector Angel had been.

He could just make them out in the distance. Angel was talking nonstop and Buffy was walking along with her hands in her pockets and her shoulders defensively hunched, not saying a word. But she was listening.

From the looks of things, Spike was pretty well shot down already.

Well, he had had his night. And that had been more than he had hoped for, more than he deserved. And it had been a perfect night, with nothing to spoil it, nothing to leave a bitter taste in his mouth. He could hold the memory of that night, every moment of it, pristine and cherished to warm his dead heart. Only one thing could have made it better. But that he knew he would never have.

He dusted a vamp who had slipped around the preoccupied Slayer but failed to notice him following, then checked to see where the two of them were. It looked like they were heading back towards Revello Drive.

He followed them until he saw Buffy step onto the porch, then turned away. He didn't want to see Angel invited into the house.

Back at the factory, he slumped into an armchair and turned on the telly, flipping unseeingly through channels, then turned the set off and flung the remote away. Sleep would keep him from thinking, but sleep wouldn't come even though he was tired, having been up throughout the day when he normally would have been sleeping. He sat there for a while, chainsmoking and sipping at one carefully measured glass of JD. More booze than that would have helped, but it took massive quantities to turn off his brain, and he wasn't going to risk being out of his head when Buffy might need him. He wasn't going to screw up in any way this time.

After an hour or so, he took off his boots and went and lay down on the bed, still fully clothed. The bed smelled of her and him and sex. He wondered how long it would take for the scent to fade away. He hoped it never would, but like all his hopes this too he knew would be futile.

He was still wide awake, staring at the ceiling when he heard footsteps at the factory doors. He came to his feet fast, then thumped back down in shock on the foot of the bed when Buffy came flying in.

"Buffy! I wasn't expecting you."

"Didn't I say I'd see you later? It took forever to get rid of Angel. I finally had to slam the door in his face and then he hung around the yard forever and then I had to make sure that he was really gone before I could come here. God! Does that man ever listen to anybody else but himself?"

"Uh, not usually." It sounded to his dazed brain as if she were mad at Angel. Which was a good thing. A very good thing. "What did he say to you?"

"Well, basically he went on and on about what," she made air quotes with her fingers, "an evil, duplicitous killer William the Bloody was. So I said that Angelus was a lot worse. Then he said it wasn't the same thing because he wasn't Angelus any more now, he had a soul. So I said you had a soul. Then he said you were lying. So I told him about Jenny's test. And he said Jenny was an incompetent because it was all just a load of crap."

Spike bit his lip to hide a grin since the Slayer didn't look as if she were in the mood for humor right now. She looked completely fed-up. Way to go, Angel.

"And he said all of this over and over, like I would finally get it through my stupid head if he only said it enough times. So I finally told him if he kept on about it I was going to scream. So then he said I was a silly, irresponsible child."

Big mistake. But then a two hundred and forty-two year old vampire who had always had his own way about everything would take that attitude towards anyone who disagreed with him.

"He always tells me what to do," she fumed. "He always thinks he knows better than me about everything."

Sounded like Angel hadn't done himself the least little bit of good tonight. Spike rejoiced, but for once had the sense to keep his mouth tightly shut.

"Leaving everything else aside," she said, "I like you a lot better than I like him."

Which wasn't everything he wanted, but was a lot more than he had ever expected. The Buffy of his reality would never have said or felt that.

"‘Preciate that, luv."

She looked at him narrowly. "You really thought that I wouldn't come tonight. That he'd turn me against you."

"Yes," he said simply.

"Silly vampire. Don't you know I make up my own mind?"

"And have you?" Then bit his lip because he hadn't meant to ask that question, too scared of what the answer might be.

"Still working things out here." She came and stood between his knees, smiling, her hands on his shoulders. He put his arms lightly around her waist, unable to believe that she was really here. "You could try persuading me."

"How?"

She brushed her parted lips against his, teasing. "You're very good at persuasion."

"Not at that!" He drew a harsh breath. "Sorry, luv. Can't joke about that. Making love with you. That's just me and you, yeah? Nothing else. No other agenda."

"It matters that much to you," she said quietly.

"I love you. It matters. Look, I've been there, pet. Thinking I can make someone love me if the sex is good enough. Had it blow up in my face. Should have known better. Won't make that mistake again. Not asking anything of you, yeah? Just this moment. Just that you be with me in this moment. Just that you want me. In this moment. Not asking for more."

Buffy looked down at the pain in his face. One day she was going to make him tell her about that. But not now. Not when the pain was so raw. That would be like putting a rough hand on an open wound. She took his upturned, vulnerable face in her hands and kissed him.

"I want you," she said softly.

His arms tightened so fiercely about her that she felt their bones would fuse together. Then he was drawing her down on the bed. They lay there, wrapped in each other's arms, kissing slowly, sensually.

He stroked her shirt and bra away, lips sliding over her breasts, then sat up to pull his T-shirt off and kick off his jeans. He drew her jeans off, then settled down beside her again. She wrapped her arms around his sides and rolled him over until he was on his back. He laughed a little, breathlessly.

"Wanna drive, pet?"

"Wanna explore. You said I could."

He looked up at her and spread his arms out in a gesture of surrender, his eyes soft. "Anything you want."

She leaned over him, smiling, running her hands over him, working her way down his torso. He made an inarticulate sound of pleasure and pushed himself up on his elbows to watch what she was doing, then caught his breath when she abruptly changed direction and raked her nails up his inner thighs.

"Well, look at that," she remarked, running her hand up and down his shaft and interestedly watching him swell and thicken. "You're so easy to get all worked up."

He grinned. "Never said I wasn't. Just have to look at you, pet, never mind this."

"Oh, well, I'll stop then."

"No, don't stop," he said quickly and they both laughed. "Wouldn't dream of interfering with your research."

She was playing with his balls now, fascinated by his reactions. She could hear his breath getting harsher and faster. "Getting to you, aren't I?"

"Oh, yeah." He shifted his weight to one elbow, freeing his other hand to slide up her ribcage and drift across her breasts. She purred and pushed against his palm, then caught his wrist and pulled his hand away.

"Quit that."

"Why? If you get to play, then I should too."

"You already know how to play me like a violin." She shook her head so that her hair trailed lightly over his stomach and cock, and laughed when he hissed. "I want to learn your buttons."

"‘K. I'll just touch your back then. Have to touch something."

Problem was that he could turn even her back into an erotic zone, running his hand and the backs of his nails in random patterns across her skin. But she was learning him too now, finding all the places that made him writhe and moan. He was growling continuously, not loud enough to be heard, but she could feel it, a vibration in his throat, his chest, that thrummed through her own body as she lay across him, an intensely erotic sensation.

"Slayer." His voice dropped into a low, raspy growl that went straight to her core. "Can't take much more of this."

"Don't be such a wuss," she laughed, but her own breath was coming fast now.

They were both playing with each other now, using hands and lips and teeth, stroking, kneading, biting softly, their breaths shaking with laughter and passion in their mouths. His hips bucked suddenly right off the bed as her hand ran across his groin. Then she was rolled onto her back and his weight was on her.

"Buffy. Have to..."

"Oh, yes," she sighed, arching against him, way past the point of play herself.

He came into her hard. She moaned and clenched around him, nails raking down his back. Their hips battled, she thrusting up as he thrust down, both of them making little, helpless, inarticulate sounds in the backs of their throats.

"Oh, my girl," he gasped. "That's it, that's it..."

"Oh, God, Spike..!"

His throat brushed her face as he strained over her with every thrust. She raised her head and sucked on it and felt him shudder in response; anywhere on his neck was an erogenous zone for him, vampire that he was. She bit the base of his neck where it met his shoulder, and his hips slammed helplessly into hers. He was ramming into her with all his strength now, all control lost, and it felt unbelievable. The Slayer in her wanted it that way, met his strength with her own.

"Oh, yes, harder, yes..." She writhed, bent like a bow under him. His head dropped and she felt his open mouth against her face, felt the gasp of his breath, opened her eyes for a shivering, delicious second to watch him, his eyes squeezed shut in pleasure so intense that it was close to pain, his lips parted and a diagonal muscle in his cheek jumping over teeth clenched in a snarl of effort.

It was too much, unendurable. She felt his cock pulse within her, felt him shudder as he came, and her own brain whited out, her orgasm shattering her into a million fragments of unbearable joy.



TBC