You're still the only one he can think about, Willow had said, and Buffy had glanced down and away because some deep, dark part of her was pleased. And it wasn't as though, she had to allow guiltily to herself, he was the only one still…fixated.
It wasn't that she didn't know the difference. The moment she'd understood what had happened, she'd begun cataloging every one, and now that Angelus was no longer pretending, they were all clear. In his smile, in his eyes. And it was still just as alluring as it had ever been, at least some of the time.
The thought made her shudder, but it wasn't any less true.
Twisting under grasping arms, she stabbed with uncommon violence and twisted, her teeth slamming together. The vampire melted into dust before she even withdrew the stake, and she stared at the little heap of ash, breathing harder than she needed to, strictly speaking.
"Nicely done."
She turned with a small and involuntary noise, whirling, hands immediately raised, but he was just watching her, leaning against a gravestone and smiling that small, sharp smile. She crossed her arms, the gesture defensive.
You should be attacking! That sounded strikingly like Giles. Go on, then… There was a stake in her hand. He didn't even glance at it, thoroughly unconcerned. "Were you just watching this whole time?" She demanded. His dark eyes half closed lazily.
"I've been following you from your house," he said. "You're distracted. Surely that's not my doing?"
Buffy felt a warm flush spread up the back of her neck and hated herself, very briefly. "Do you think I won't kill you?" She felt stupid the moment the words were out, and the corner of his mouth ticked up in a gesture that made her stomach twist with its familiarity.
"Not yet. As evidenced…" Angelus laughed, softly. "Don't worry. I promise I won't kill you. At least not yet. That'd be terribly anticlimactic."
"You're not going to throw me off like this," Buffy said defiantly, and sounded in her own ears like a child. Angelus took a deep breath in.
"I disagree, Buffy." He said her name in almost exactly the same way. God. Just similar enough to keep her grasping…she could see his dark eyes glittering behind those lazy lids. "Everything about you tells me I already am. Your heartbeat, your breathing, your scent…" He exhaled, a useless gesture, she knew, an affectation. The sigh was akin to the one Xander might make on smelling food cooking at a distance.
Buffy's crossed arms tightened, as though she could keep all of that to herself. "Are you just going to talk at me?" She challenged. Angelus straightened, and moved.
Angel had seemed graceful to Buffy, almost impossibly so. Watching Angelus now, she knew he'd been holding himself back, movements restrained, uncomfortable in his own skin. This fluid, easy grace was what was natural for him, and at once jarringly unnatural and strangely thrilling for her. He prowled in a slow semi-circle and she turned with him.
"Would you like me to?" His head was tilted slightly to the side again. Bird, she thought, and then corrected, cat. Watching a bird. Watching me. "I have all kinds of other ideas, if you'd prefer."
If Angel's voice had been like silk, Angelus' was like velvet. Her skin crawled and tried to shiver at the same time, and her belly clenched, her imagination taking the reins in its teeth and running away with it. The mental pictures – ones she would never confess to anyone – distracted her just long enough for her to miss the three steps that took him behind and to her, one hand holding the wrist with the stake, the other curled around her neck.
Her mind gibbered with instinctual fear. Her body was very aware of the solidity of a gorgeous male body nearby. The dichotomy froze her.
"As I said," he murmured. "Distracted. You're thinking. Comparing. You can see it, can't you? Feel it. This is how I should be. Complete and unfettered."
She tried to twist away, but she felt her wrist bones grind together as his hand tightened. His voice was very close to her ear, and she could just glimpse him out of the corner of her eye. "You enjoyed it, didn't you? Our night."
"It wasn't you," Buffy said, something coiling and twisting inside her. She thought it was nausea but couldn't be sure.
"No?" She could hear Angelus' smile, the quiet mockery. "Of course it was. I was there. I felt everything. And I know just how much I was holding back." His lips were cool where they brushed her neck, no teeth. "I could have had you screaming. I could have had you twisted into so many knots you didn't know which way was up." His voice dropped, barely audible. "I could have had you begging me to make an end." His hand slid down from cupping her neck to run lightly over one of her breasts, one cool thumb skimming bare skin.
Buffy felt herself wake up and jerked, slamming an elbow back as her drooping eyes snapped open. I was practically, she thought, as Angelus danced away, laughing, graceful and beautiful and wonderful to watch, and she could too easily imagine walking too willingly into that trap. His smile showed his teeth. The human ones.
"You still want it," he purred. "Want me. Death and pain; it's in your nature as much as mine."
She gripped the stake more tightly and raised it. "Come closer and say that again," she challenged, but her bravado was false and they both knew it.
"How many times do you think I thought about the taste of your blood, even with that damned leash of a soul? How many times did I tear you apart in dreams and enjoy every minute of it?"
His voice was like a caress. She wanted him touching her again. She wanted to drive the stake in and twist. Buffy stayed where she was, narrowed eyes following his every (graceful, poetry in motion) movement. "I really don't care," she said, deliberately casually. "Are we going to do this or not?"
"Do what?" He paused, almost seeming to sway. "Fight?" He leaned forward, slightly. "Fuck?"
The word rolled off his tongue, harsh and alluring. Buffy felt a jerk deep in her belly, momentary arousal stirring before she shoved it down, but he'd smelled it. Surely he'd… "Fight," she said, through her teeth. "I'd never…"
His dark eyes were wide, now. "I'm not in the mood, but if you insist…just the same. 'Never say never,' isn't that right? I can be quite…persuasive."
Buffy swallowed hard. "No," she said. His eyes, she thought, were watching her throat.
"Would it really be so terrible? I can do wonderful things with my tongue." He paused, momentarily. "Or so I have been told." Buffy felt herself flushing warmly, and knew he would know. She held her silence. Angelus closed one eye and looked at her out of the other. "Do you think your mother might be more willing?" he said, something playing around his mouth. "Or perhaps your clever friend…Willow."
"Don't you-" Buffy started to hiss, stepping forward, and realized he was grinning at her. It was an unnerving expression. "I'm going to kill you," she promised.
"Or I will kill you. But that can wait, can't it?" He looked distant. "Just imagine…I remember how warm you are, Buffy. How tight and slick. How I could slide my finger into you and suck one of those pert pink nipples of yours…"
She was warm between her legs, and suspected there might be wet as well. Her blood was pounding in her ears and she felt hot all over. "Stop," she said, and there was too much of a gasp about it. He laughed, soft and low and hungry, and for just a moment she thought about it. Caution to the wind.
It passed quickly. Sort of. Not quickly enough.
"Do you really want me to?" He moved again, one of those quick, almost unseen steps, and caught her still upraised wrist again, was standing right there looking down at her, and she could see her lover in those eyes, her once-lover and something still more terrible and fascinating.
"Yes," she said. Angelus seemed disappointed.
"Ah, well," he sighed. "Another night." His teeth gleamed, for a moment. Then he was kissing her.
It felt just like kissing Angel. Just exactly like, up until he caught her lip between his teeth and bit down hard enough to draw blood. His tongue swiped across the mark before she could react, and then he stepped back like a shadow.
"Go on, then," he said, velvet-voiced. "Back to the light. Sleep. I think you'll dream of me."
Then he was gone.
And she did, god, she did, and woke in the early morning twisting with a whimper on her tongue.