This one's the longest chapter of the bunch, and probably my favorite. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

XI. Time, Truth, and Hearts

"So, what exactly are we doing in the library in the middle of the night?" Buffy asked.

"Sparring," said Angel.

Buffy turned to look at him and saw that he had removed his coat and was halfway through unbuttoning his shirt, revealing the white cotton v-neck underneath it. She swallowed, trying not to look at or think about his torso. Just last night, he'd been injured by one of the demons they'd been fighting. The wound hadn't been major, but she'd still insisted on patching him up, which had required him to be shirtless. She hadn't been able to think straight in any of her classes the following day, and several pages of her sparser-than-usual notes contained sketches of his tattoo in the margins. "Why spar when we could just patrol some more?" she said.

"Because I'm going to show you how Darla, Penn, Dru, and Spike fight."

Buffy's eyes widened. "You mean you're ready to fight them?" Giles had told her of his conversation with Angel, as a result of which she hadn't been pressing him to plan their attack on the other vampires. She hadn't expected him to bring it up this soon.

Angel grimaced. "I don't know if I'll ever be ready to fight them," he said, "but that's no reason why you shouldn't be." He set his shirt on the table next to his coat, then slipped off his shoes. Buffy did the same, glad she was dressed in comfortable, stretchy clothes.

After she tucked a stake into the waistband of her pants, they moved to the large open space in the center of the library. "So, which opponent will I be facing first?" she said. This exercise intrigued her greatly.

"Got a preference?"

"Hmm," she said, tapping her chin thoughtfully with a finger. "Darla," she decided after a few seconds.

"Okay," said Angel. He began to pace in a wide circle, and Buffy copied him. "For Darla, this is personal. You killed the Master, and she wants you dead for that. You two are going to be pretty evenly matched, though. She's had a long time to work on her technique, but you're the same size as her and have about the same strength. But Darla fights dirty. If there's anything she can do to give herself the edge, she'll do it. She's fast and she's vicious." They halted and faced each other.

"You sure you can imitate her style from all the way up there?" asked Buffy teasingly, shifting her weight from one foot to the other in preparation for the first part of their sparring match.

Angel smirked. "I think I can pull it off."

Buffy nodded, indicating she was ready. Angel lunged at her. She dropped one foot back and caught him by the arm, sending him skidding along the floor to the base of the short flight of steps leading to the bookstacks.

"Is this really a good idea?" she said anxiously as he got to his feet.

"I can handle it," he said.

"Actually I was more worried about whether the library can handle it," Buffy clarified.

Angel chuckled. "I'll try not to break anything in here if you will."

"Deal."

He dove at her again, blocking before she could use his weight against him like the first time. He aimed a few open-handed blows at her head, which she deflected, then seized her by the shoulders. He tried to throw her, but her stance was too firm, so he ended up sending them both rolling. He leapt to his feet first, but she swung her leg around and knocked him back to the ground. Before he could get up again, she pinned him and thunked the blunt end of her stake against his chest.

They continued to practice this scenario for about half an hour, by which point Angel was satisfied that Buffy would be prepared to go up against the real Darla.

"Okay," Buffy said, bouncing on her feet a little as they circled each other again. Endorphins and adrenaline were pumping through her and she was eager for the next stage of the sparring. "Who will I be fighting next?"

"Spike," said Angel. "He doesn't really have a set technique, he just fights with a combination of brutality, taunts, and evasion. That coat he wears billows up behind him a lot when he moves, so make sure you don't let it distract you." He picked up his own coat off the table as he spoke and put it back on. "He loses his temper easily, and that's when he makes the most mistakes. Always have your stake in your hand when you're fighting him. He's killed two Slayers, and he managed it because he got them away from their weapons. The harder you fight, the harder he'll fight back. He'll only slow down when one of you is dead."

This time, there was much less grappling and much more punching and kicking. Though Angel didn't throw in any verbal taunts, his body language had the same effect as spoken jeers all on its own. This was surprisingly irritating and distracting, but only heightened Buffy's determination to win. They had a close call with one of the bookcases about fifteen minutes in, but by the time another half hour had passed, their surroundings were still intact.

Before continuing on to part three, they took a short break. Angel stretched a bit while Buffy went to get a drink of water at the drinking fountain in the hall. "Intermission over," she announced as she strode back inside the library. Angel's coat was once again on the table. "Drusilla next?"

Angel nodded, looking thoughtful for a moment. "Dru is probably the most dangerous," he said eventually. "Even though she's the weakest physically, she's insane and she can see the future. In a fight, that gives her the advantages of being unpredictable and of knowing her opponent's moves before they make them. Never ever look into her eyes. She can hypnotize you with a single glance. Try to throw her off by thinking about the wrong moves so she'll have a harder time figuring out the moves you're really going to make."

This fight was definitely the most challenging so far. Buffy had a hard time with the rule about not looking into the eyes—that was normally where she picked up hints about her opponent's next move. Every time she slipped up and looked him in the eye, Angel made them start over. He used such a wide, disjointed array of moves against her that she probably wouldn't have been able to see them coming even without the eye rule, but she got better and better at adjusting anyway. It was also hard to think about one move while doing a different one and blocking his, but that too got easier with practice. By the time she passed him up in the number of rounds won, this part had gone on for nearly a full hour.

They took an even longer break once they finished. Buffy knew she was probably going to spend the entire day at school feeling more sore and exhausted than she had in her whole career as a Slayer, but for now, she still had enough energy to burn for the fourth and final portion of the sparring session.

"Ready?" Angel said when she returned from another trip to the drinking fountain.

"Yep," said Buffy.

"Okay. Penn fights like me, but sloppier. He never had the patience to learn finesse. If you can take me, you can take him."

"So I'm fighting you this time?" she asked.

He nodded.

Buffy grinned. She'd had many opportunities to observe his fighting style during their patrols over the last couple of weeks. This was going to be fun. He opened with a roundhouse kick that would have hit her squarely in the head if she hadn't ducked. She kicked back, but he blocked it, then came at her with a powerful reverse punch. She dodged, grabbed his arm at the elbow and wrist, then swung it around so that he was pulled off his feet and went sprawling on the floor, but he quickly rolled and was back upright in a second.

For the first twenty minutes, every time Buffy got close to hitting his chest with the blunt end of the stake, he would suddenly reclaim the upper hand and put her back into defense mode. The fight moved up the steps to continue amidst the bookshelves, and thanks to her smaller size, Buffy had the advantage in these closer quarters. She finally succeeded in throwing him back against the wall, and the stake touched his chest a split-second before his hand could close around her wrist.

She smirked triumphantly up at him, covered in sweat, her chest heaving as the two and a half hours of exertion caught up to her. Her smirk faded, however, at the sight of the intense look on his face and the way his eyes bored into hers. She didn't know which of them moved first, but the next second, the stake had fallen to the floor with a clatter, their arms were locked tightly around each other, and they were kissing fiercely.

Buffy couldn't form a coherent thought. She'd never been kissed like this in her life. His cool body felt wonderful against her own overheated one. She pressed even closer, wanting more of that contact, and she stood on tiptoe to get a better angle for kissing him. After what might have been several minutes for all she could tell, she became dimly aware that he had maneuvered them so that she was the one with her back to the bookshelves.

She never wanted him to stop, but then the stray observation that it felt so different kissing him than it had to kiss Ben drifted across her mind. It was as if her heart had turned to ice. She broke away from Angel with a gasp that was more of a sob. "Oh, God," she said, covering her mouth with her hand, tears blurring her vision. "Ben."

Angel's expression of dazed confusion at the abrupt end of the kiss turned stricken at the sound of the name. "I'm sorry!" he said, jerking his hands away from her as if he'd been burned and taking a step back. "I shouldn't have—"

"No!" said Buffy, trying to pull herself together, but her voice was still shaky and cracked. "It's not you! I'm not blaming you. It's just—it hasn't even been three months since he died. I shouldn't be kissing anyone!" She felt like she might be sick. Ben deserved better than this. She should be able to show more respect and grieve a decent length of time. She felt Angel's tentative hand on her shoulder, and she allowed him to pull her into his arms, now crying harder than ever.

Angel deserved better than this, too, and Ben would want her to move on and be happy. She'd been trying to pretend the feelings weren't there, but now that she was being honest with herself, she could admit that she was falling for Angel hard and fast. She had expected him to be more like the man Angelus had described—rude and licentious, perhaps—but he wasn't. He was quiet and polite and considerate almost to a fault; she always felt completely safe around him; and, like Cordelia, now that he had a soul, she was free to acknowledge how gorgeous he was.

After a few minutes of being held by him, her crying subsided, but she made no effort to move out of his arms. She felt a little better now. That was the first time she'd really allowed herself to cry after Ben's death. She'd been carrying the grief and pain inside her all this time, but getting them out into the open seemed to have eased their weight in her chest and afforded her a sense of peace.

"You know," said Angel quietly, "I've wanted to kiss you since the first moment I saw you after the curse?"

Buffy looked up at him in surprise, tears still clinging to her cheeks and eyelashes.

"You were standing there and I thought you were the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. But then everything came back, and I didn't think you could ever think of me that way." He smiled ruefully. "It was almost enough and already more than I deserved just to help you with your French homework and patrol with you."

After a brief examination of her feelings, Buffy decided it was safe to let him know what his words meant to her. She stood on tiptoe again and kissed him. Though it was their second, this was much closer to her idea of a first kiss: gentle, hesitant, and sweet. When they broke apart, she smiled at him. They moved back to the main part of the library to retrieve their shoes and his shirt and coat. "Walk me home?" she asked shyly when he was ready to go, holding out a hand. He took it and they departed the library together.

Buffy was so drained, both physically and emotionally, that she didn't even protest when Angel scooped her up into his arms a couple of blocks away from the school and carried her the rest of the way home. She merely snuggled against his broad chest, and by the time he reached their destination, she was fast asleep. With only slight difficulty, he managed to get up to the roof and through her window without waking her. Still being careful not to disturb her, he pulled back the covers on her bed and laid her down, then removed her shoes and tucked her in. Before leaving, he leaned down and pressed a brief kiss to the corner of her mouth.

Okay, hands up: how many of you suspected the sparring would lead to kissing? *grin* I think my favorite bit of sparring was the Drusilla bit, what with the eye contact rule and the unpredictability.