Chapter 3

February 17, 2005

The scenery goes by quickly; homes give way to businesses, it's not long before she finds herself in front of the Crashdown Café and turning into the back parking lot, mentally preparing herself for meeting that is about to happen. She shouldn't be nervous, those people, the people who are sitting in her restaurant mean nothing to her.

They are the ones that should be nervous…if they knew she was coming. She has nothing to be ashamed of; she did what she had to do to save the world. Sleeping with Kyle was the only sure way she knew of that would get Max to fall out of love with her and it worked like a charm.

"Why are we just sitting here mommy?" Lucas innocently questions her.

"Well, baby, Mommy is a little nervous, we're about to meet up with some people that I have seen in a long time." Liz explains.

"Are they nice?"

"I used to think so, but they hurt mommy a great deal and they stopped being nice." She gathers her sweater from the passenger seat and exits the car. Crossing behind her vehicle she opens the rear passenger door, unbuckles her son's car seat and lifts him out of the chair. "Oh your so heavy baby. You're growing like a tree. Let's hope you didn't inherit your natural father's height deficiency." Liz chuckles and grabs Lucas's travel bag swinging it onto her shoulder.

Liz shuts the door and locks the car with the locking/unlocking remote on her key chain. Spike bought the car for her; she had been looking into new cars for a couple of months previous, Spike saw her circling different kinds of PT Cruisers. For her birthday he took her to the car dealership (at night of course) asked her which PT, she wanted and the next day called the dealer and paid for the car.

"Will he be here?" Lucas wants to know.

"Yes honey, he will be." She's always been truthful to him about his natural father. Liz knew that someday she would come back to Roswell if only for a visit and the last thing she wanted was to have Lucas hurt if his paternity came to light about Kyle being his biological father. Besides it wasn't as if she could hide it, Lucas looks so much like him. From his short dark blonde hair to his to his piercing blue eyes, she really hopes however that he gets the height from her side of the family, most of the men in her family were over six feet.

"Will daddy still be my daddy?" Scared that Spike, now that his real dad is in the picture, wasn't going to his father anymore.

"Of course he will sweetie. Just because your meeting Kyle today doesn't mean he's going to be a part of your life, not if you don't want him too. And even if you do want to get to know your natural father, Spike will still be your daddy." Liz explains. She understands her son's fears; he doesn't want Spike to be hurt if he decides he wants a relationship with Kyle.

"Does he know about me?"

"No honey. After Kyle and I were…together that night we weren't on good terms anymore. See he really cared about this other girl and when we got together and made you he was upset that it would ruin his chances with the girl. So he took his anger out on me and I never told him that we made a beautiful child that night." Liz sets Lucas down on the hood of the car.

"Is he a bad man?" Frightened that his natural father was like the boogey men that haunted the city he lived in.

Liz licks her lips and thinks of a way to explain it to him. "He's not a bad man Luke, he was just angry. Kyle is a nice man but sometimes when people get angry they say things they don't mean. From what Alex tells me he's sorry for the way he acted that night and wishes he could take it back. I promise you Kyle is not a boogey man."

"Were you mad at him too?"

"Yea, I was, I still am a little, but you know something I'm also very grateful to him. Do you know why?"

Lucas shakes his head negatively. "It's because he gave me you," she caresses his cheek, "and he also helped me meet your daddy."

"How'd he help?" Lucas shrugs his shoulders in confusion.

"If he and my old friends hadn't have acted the way they did I never would have met your daddy. I probably would have stayed in Roswell and never known of him." She probably would have met the others because she would have gone to visit Fred at some point, but not Spike.

The only reason they met was because she had needed protection from a demon. Since Angel and Buffy were off on their month long honeymoon, Cordy was staying at a friends while her ghost infested apartment was being fumigated for bugs. With Gunn it would have been awkward to have him guard her since they had broken up a month previous and Wesley and Fred while capable of taking care of themselves weren't that strong in the physical category.

Which brought in Spike, Wesley phoned him, told him that situation and that his assist was needed. From the moment she set eyes on Spike she knew that he was going to be hers, she had fallen and hard. According to Spike he had the same reaction to her, even if he did try to down play it at their first meeting.

"Is Uncle Alex and Aunt Serena going to be here?" Lucas voice breaks Liz out of her memory.

Liz nods her head in confirmation. "And it's 'are' sweetie." She corrects his grammar out of habit.

"What's 'are'?" He swings his little legs back and forth in boredom

Liz chuckles, "Never mind." She kisses his forehead and picks him up again. "Ready to go see them?"

"Yea." He wraps his small chubby limbs around his mother's waist and neck, he misses Alex and Serena, they were cool. Uncle Alex would fly him around the room in his arms so he could pretend he was Superman. Sometimes he would even pretend to be the evil Lex Luthor. Aunt Serena would let him help her cook whenever she made a big dinner. He loved pounding the bread dough.

Slowly Liz makes her way toward the front of the Crashdown. She can see through the window, there the 'I Know an Alien Club' is sitting in their regular booth with somber expressions, with the group in the booth were their significant others. While Alex and Serena are sitting at the counter, Mariah and Jasmine age 2, are Alex and Serena's twin girls were being baby sat over at the Whitman's.

Lucas doesn't like the girls all that much, he says they're no fun and all they play with is Barbie Doll's. Liz told him that GI Joe were also dolls, but Lucas set her straight immediately. Barbie's were dolls and GI Joe's were action figures, and there's a huge a difference.

Taking a deep breath Liz calms some of her nerves and pulls open the Crashdown doors ready to meet with people she hasn't seen or cared about in five years.

TBC