Title: A Different Type of Stake

Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Rating: M

Word count: 897

Summary: Buffy challenges Spike to go a week without telling her he loves her. To win the bet, she has to make him. Smutty, Spuffy fun with a touch of angst. Set S6 pre-"As You Were".

Disclaimer: Joss Whedon owns everything, including my soul.

Prologue: Monday Morning

Buffy rolled over, the rough Persian rug beneath her pricking the bare skin of her back and scraping along her buttocks. Finding herself awake, she found that once again the floor had once again proved itself an open and convenient location for her and Spike's nighttime undulations. She propped herself up on her elbow, facing the vampire's prone ivory body. He slept with one arm thrown behind his head, the other lying akimbo across the crimson, satin duvet that incompletely covered them both. Sleeping, he lay utterly still, the perfect corpse, until his eyes suddenly blinked open to see Buffy's resting on him. The sunlight from the tiny window above fell onto her alone, illuminating her tousled hair in a golden halo. He couldn't help but smile at her angelic appearance in the morning light, so out of place in his dank, musty crypt. As she still lounged unmoving, her eyes meeting his, he said the first thing that came into his newly awakened brain: "I love you, Buffy."

At these words, she threw a disappointed look at him and stood up, taking the duvet with her in an attempt at belated, post-coital modesty. She uncovered Spike's nakedness in the process leaving her in a limbo of shame, looking away from the body she had so recently seen, and touched, so much of. "I wish you'd stop saying that, Spike," she said, dropping the coverlet and wrapping herself in a sheet to look for her clothes.

Spike stood up, too, clearly completely lacking for any need to cover himself. "Come on, Slayer, I know you like hearing it. You wouldn't flinch so much if it didn't mean something."

Buffy had located her clothes and was pulling them on hurriedly. "You know, if you really loved me you'd stop when I told you to." When she was dressed, she met his eye. "I bet you couldn't go a week without saying it, just to weird me." She crossed her arms defiantly over her chest.

"Is that a bet, love? 'Cause Spike, he don't back down from a wager." Spike walked up close to her, daring her to step away from him, to back down from the challenge.

"Yeah, it's a bet alright." Buffy seemed surprised by the words coming out of her mouth, but knew there was no way she could yield to Spike's posturing. She rallied to name the terms. "One week, no 'I love you,' no 'I'm in love with you.' You lose, you leave me alone for one whole month, meaning no touching, no sexual innuendo, no nothing. Got it, buster?"

"Sure that's what you want as your reward, Goldilocks? " Spike raised his incongruously dark eyebrows at her suggestively. She looked at him impassively, ready for him to put an end to the game. "Anyway, what do I get if I don't say it for a week?"

Buffy pursed her lips, thinking. Then she looked resigned. "Me. One week, whatever you want. Deal?"

Spike smirked, then said, "I get a week, you get a month? Since when is that fair?" Buffy opened her mouth to respond, but he went on. "Fine, deal. The week ends Sunday at midnight."

He held his hand out for them to shake on it. When Buffy put her small hand in his, he pulled her to him. "Just so you know, gambling with me, it's a risky venture, pet," he said, his voice low and his mouth just inches away from hers. "I never lose."

Buffy just cocked an eyebrow at the boast. "How'd you end up owing 40 kittens then, Spike? And I'm not some lame, old fish-head. I'm the slayer, you're a vampire and you know who always wins in that situation." Letting go of his hand and grabbing her jacket, she swept out of the crypt, swinging open the door just wide enough that Spike had to leap out of the way of the sunlight that streamed in.

As she walked away quickly through the empty cemetery, she cursed silently to herself. Why was she betting with Spike? And how had she ended up on the side where she was trying to make him say he loved her? Perhaps getting involved with Spike did not include the wisest choices, but she couldn't back down now. Not without surrendering to Spike's side of the deal and there was no way that she was going to let him take control, even for a week. Especially for a week. She would just have to make him say he loved her soon. At least there would be something to occupy her mind during the long, tedious, and greasy hours at the Doublemeat Palace. Usually she tried not to think about Spike, ever, but this week she'd have to make an exception. As she climbed in her own bedroom window to make Dawn think she'd slept there, she was still concentrating on how to win her bet with Spike.

In his crypt, Spike stood grinning and watching the door the slayer had slammed behind her. He lifted his hand to his face and licked it hand where the grip of Buffy's nails had drawn blood. He could win if he really put his mind to it. He didn't have to say he loved her, even if he thought it, right? This was going to be an interesting week, he felt sure.

A/N: Please review and tell me if you're interested! Sorry it's short, but, don't worry, smutty times start tomorrow. And those of you who are reading my other fics, I'm still working on them.