"Blood

"Blood?"

"It wasn't ketchup."

"But she was the girl from the Coppertone commercial, she can't be a vampire."

"Yeah, I thought vampires didn't photograph."

"I thought you said the vampire was a guy."

"She wasn't a guy, that I can say with utmost conviction."

"Shut up, Kyle."

They were all standing on the sidewalk in front of the Crashdown. The Coppertone girl had gotten away before Michael and Kyle could catch up with her or before Max and Isabel even knew what had happened. Now they were staring out on the street at a complete loss.

"Start from the beginning," Max said in a calm, rational voice, even though a vein on the side of his neck was throbbing.

"Well, uh…" Kyle started.

"There was this…" Michael fumbled.

"She came in, ordered food, these guys were too busy drooling over her to notice that she was carrying around a pint of blood," Maria summed up. "She left, and then the Marx brothers tripped over their own tongues trying to catch her."

"But it was light out, wasn't it?" Isabel reasoned. "If she was a vampire she wouldn't have been able to go outside."

"It wasn't real dark but it was past sunset." Michael said.

"But it was a girl," Max said. "Whatever attacked Liz was a guy. What did she look like?"

"You've seen that suntan commercial haven't you? She was in the brown bikini." Michael replied.

"Dark hair, dark eyes, legs like a----" Kyle continued.

Maria rolled her eyes and stomped inside. When she came back out Kyle was still describing her.

"—the size of melons…."

Maria stomped on his foot as she walked by him and while he hopped around on it she handed Max a slip of paper.

"She called in an order."

Max looked at the paper.

"Cordelia Chase."

"Her parents were Shakespeare fans, other than that it tells us nothing." Isabel declared. "Unless—did she pay with a credit card?"

"Cash."

"It looks like she ordered enough food for four people."

"Do vampires eat stuff other then blood?" Michael asked, looking at Maria.

"I don't think so, but the stuff I found at the library was pretty nonexistent. I was going to try the shop on Citrus next."

"You said the blood was in a container?" Max asked.

Maria nodded.

"I've never heard of a vampire drinking blood out of anything other then a neck," Kyle said.

Max handed him the food order receipt.

"Kyle, see if your father can find anything on this name. It's kind of unusual so maybe we'll get lucky. Maria, you and Isabel go to that store and see if you can find anything useful. Michael and I will head in the direction the car went and see if we can come across it."

"That's a heck of a long shot, don't you think?" Isabel said.

"Yeah, but I have to do something."

* * * * *

"Well, it's nice to see you're doing better."

Liz looked over her shoulder and saw Angel's companions walk in. She had been sitting, eating biscotti, that was indeed stale, with Angel.

"Liz Parker," Angel said. "This is Cordelia Chase, Charles Gunn, and Wesley Wyndam-Pryce."

They all nodded at her and smiled. Somehow knowing their names made her feel more reassured, especially now that the odds were four against one.

Cordelia walked over to them and plopped a bag down on the table. Then she handed Angel a wet paper bag. He opened it and pulled out a half empty container of a red liquid.

"Where's the rest of it?" He asked.

"On the front seat of your car," Gunn said.

"My car?"

"It spilled when I got the food and the second bag started leaking too."

"On the leather?"

Cordy started passing out burgers.

"Leather, yeah right." She said.

Liz stared at the cup that Cordy put down in front of her.

"You got this at the Crashdown."

"Yeah, a tacky little alien-themed place. Like they couldn't have come up with a better idea in a town that is already littered with cheesy alien crap."

"My parents own it," Liz said.

"Which is probably why she lives above the place," Gunn pointed out.

Cordelia gave a fake, embarrassed chuckle and handed Liz a napkin.

"My parents must be going crazy. And Max---" She stood up. "I have to at least call them."

"I'm sorry," Wesley said. "That's not a good idea."

"Why not? How can it hurt to let them know that I'm alright?"

"Because we don't know what is after you exactly and we don't want to let anyone know where you are."

"But I have friends who can help me."

"I'm sure that you do, but the forces at work here may be—unusual—and we're better equipped to deal with it then your friends."

"You don't know them," Liz shot back.

She thought about Max. She knew what he'd be doing. He would think whatever happened to her was his fault. He'd be turning over the most dire possibilities that he could think of in his head. He'd be going crazy. She remembered when he was kidnapped by agent Pierce. She remembered how sick she'd felt, how helpless. She wouldn't let him go through what she did.

"I'm going to call him or I am out of here!" She cried defiantly, knowing full well that if they didn't want to let her go there wasn't a whole lot she could do about it. She decided not to take any chances. She turned and stomped toward the door. Not one of them made any move to stop her but they did glance at each other.

"Liz," Angel said patiently. She yanked open the door and felt the cool night air brush her face. "You may endanger him if you drag him into this. It's best to keep everyone unnecessary out of it."

He said the one thing that would stop her.

When Max Evans saved her life, his life had been thrown into turmoil. He put his existence in jeopardy to bring her back from the dead. She refused to do anything that would put him into any more danger than he already was in because of her.

She closed her eyes, felt the slight breeze one more time and then she slammed the door shut with a cry of frustration.

* * * * *

"Cordelia Chase," Sheriff Valenti muttered as he typed it into his computer. He looked up at Kyle. "Anything else you can tell me?"

"She likes Coppertone?"

Valenti furrowed his brows.

"She was driving a big black convertible."

"Did you get a license plate?"

Kyle shook his head. The guidance counselor that said he was suited for law enforcement was full of crap. Of course it turned out she was an undercover FBI agent so there you go.

"Well let's see what we come up with." He typed in the name and a few seconds later a list popped up on his screen.

"Cordelia Chase, Road Island, 84, arrested in…."

"Not her," Kyle said.

"Okay…." He read through a few other names until he came across: "Cordelia Chase, 20 years old, applied for a private detective license two years ago. "

"It could be her, where does she live?"

"Los Angeles."

"That's her."

"How do you know?"

"Everyone who lives in LA is an actress."

Valenti picked up his phone and started dialing.

"What are you doing?" Kyle asked.

"Calling the detective agency she works for."

Kyle leaned in close to listen. But it was a machine that picked up.

"Angel Investigations, " a female voice said cheerily. "We help the helpless." Kyle started pointing to the phone, nodding vigorously. "I'm afraid we're out of town on urgent business but if this is an emergency please dial: "

Valenti scribbled the number down and then hung up and dialed again.

"That was her voice," Kyle insisted.

"Caritas, karaoke bar," a voice said on the other line.

"Excuse me?" The sheriff said.

"What, you were expecting maybe the Playboy mansion?"

"I was expecting a detective agency."

"Oh, you called Angel's first. Don't worry, we help the helpless here too, especially if you're having trouble with your range. What can I do for you?"

"I really wanted to talk to Cordelia."

"Well Cordy and the gang are out of town right now, working on their tans in some godforsaken desert. They left me in charge of any emergencies here on the home front. So tell me your worries, you sound like a closet Elton John lover. Go ahead, give me a couple of bars of Crocodile Rock and I'll tell you all you need to know."

"Listen, I'm looking for a missing girl and I don't have time—"

"And tell junior next to you to give me a selection of Brittany Spears and I can tell him all about his future love life with a gorgeous blond that would put that teenage pop star to shame."

"What are you—" The Sheriff felt his blood run cold. "How do you know my son is here?"

"Well, that's what I do, sheriff."

Valenti slammed the phone down.

* * * * *

Angel found Liz on the roof. She was staring up at a cluster of stars. Angel looked up and realized that the stars were really brilliant here. There weren't as many harsh city lights drowning out how spectacular they looked.

Liz heard him approach and he watched her rub tears out of her eyes.

"Are you OK?" He asked.

"I've been better," she said. "I just want this to be over so I can get back to Max."

"He's your boyfriend?"

Boyfriend. That seemed so insignificant a word to describe what he meant to her.

"He's my everything," she said. "He and I have been through so much together. The obstacles we've had to overcome to get where we are have been so monumental I can't even describe them. But we saw it through and we're together—finally. But something always comes up, something like this and some times it doesn't seem like it's ever going to stop. I will never have a normal life I guess."

She rubbed her eyes again and looked at Angel.

"You probably think I'm just some lovesick teenager who thinks being grounded on Friday night falls under monumental obstacle."

"No," he said quietly. "I know about monumental obstacles. I have the scars to prove them."

"From who?"

He was still for a long time. Liz wondered what a supposed vampire could know about true love.

"She was about your age when I met her. And I tried," he shook his head. "I tried, to keep myself from falling in love with her. There were the obvious reasons—she was sixteen, I was two hundred and forty. I was a vampire, she was a vampire slayer…."

"A vampire slayer," Liz said.

"One girl in all the world that is chosen to fend off the vampires." He said matter of factly. "But it didn't matter. She was like water in a desert. We couldn't stay away from each other no matter how hard we tried."

Liz watched his face and the intensity when he spoke was visible in every feature.

"What happened?" Liz asked when he didn't seem inclined to finish. "With her?"

"We decided we couldn't stay together. She deserved a life I could never give her. A normal life."

Liz felt like her heart dropped to her feet.

"It may not end like that for you and Max," he said, reading her thoughts. "I'm sure you two don't have nearly as much to overcome. Buffy and I were from two different worlds."

Two different worlds? Why did he have to put it that way? She rubbed her arms, suddenly chilled and desperate to stop thinking of the things Angel had just inadvertently presented her with.

"So you told me that you were a vampire. I didn't think vampires would help people."

"They generally don't as a rule. But I was cursed by a band of gypsies that restored my soul."

Liz's eyebrows furrowed so he explained.

"When you become a vampire you lose your soul and the demon takes over. You feed on people without remorse. You become more monster then man."

"Some women like a little monster in their man," a cocky English accented voice said.

Liz turned and saw a tall man with white-blond hair perched on the ledge behind them, his long black leather duster flapping in the wind like a cape. Then Angel's hand was gripping her arm, hard.

"Get downstairs with the others," he told her and the gentle voice was gone. Suddenly his tone matched the horrific face that she had seen on the roof outside her bedroom. He pushed her behind him protectively and he faced the man on the ledge. The next word he spoke he spat out like a curse word: "Spike."