A/N: Well, this epilogue grew into a mini-chapter in its own right, and was giving me fits, so very heartfelt thanks to Nevermore for the emergency beta--your comments were, as always, invaluable.
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Afterwards, she lay curled against him, hair clinging damply to his shoulder, drifting. They could still hear rain pattering steadily on the stone roof. He'd managed to get up long enough to dig a blanket out of his discarded luggage, and now he was just lying there, listening to her breathe, wondering if he could convince her to just stake him right now so he could go out on a high note. Not likely, he realized, and then moved on to wondering just what it said about their relationship that her not wanting to kill him was a new development.
Buffy had a feeling that she was still going to have some major recoil to deal with from this whole series of events, but for now she was content to just stay in this unlikely haven and enjoy the benefits of having finally made a decision. "Well," she murmured in his ear, sending shivers down his spine, "the world didn't end."
"Mmm," Spike agreed indistinctly. "Always a good sign in these parts."
She sighed lazily, and raised her head just enough to check her watch. "I think that's a record."
"Doubt it," he replied, fondly remembering some of their multi-hour marathons.
She giggled, and swatted his shoulder. "Not that, you moron."
"Then what?" There were other kinds of records now?
"Twenty minutes. That's the longest we've ever gone without fighting after…" She felt her cheeks growing hot, told herself wryly that if she could do it, she should probably be able to say it. "After sex."
He shrugged, just enough to joggle her head slightly. "Only because we haven't been talking. Give us time, love, we're out of practice."
She smiled. "I'm not worried." Then she added, yawning, "Too bad there'll probably never be any kind of arguing shortage. 'Cause you and I'd get rich."
"Awfully mercenary of you, Slayer," he noted approvingly. "I'm proud of you." He settled a hand underneath his head, and drew her closer with his other arm, unable to shake the uneasy feeling that this could all explode at any second. Still, he planned to take full advantage of it while he could, no matter how surreal it seemed.
"Been hanging out with Anya too much." She refused to analyze the shiver of excitement that spiraled into her stomach as he tightened his hold on her. She glanced around, her eyes falling on a duffel bag that seemed to have sprung a leak. Now that she thought of it, there did seem to be a distinct alcohol edge to the smell of rain and sex that permeated the room. Hmm. "I think I might've spilled some of your puke-inducing substances."
"Smashed them beyond all recognition, more like. There was a bottle of triple-cask Balvenie in there, too." Ordinarily, he'd've been mourning the loss, but considering the circumstances, he couldn't really find it in himself to care. Not that he wasn't going to milk this for whatever it was worth.
"Triple-who Bal-what-ie?"
He gave a long-suffering sigh. "You're a right Philistine, you know that? You college birds think it's all Monarch and Busch Light. Wouldn't recognize good alcohol if it bit you on the ass."
"I've been bitten plenty by your alcohol, thanks. Besides, you probably just stole it anyway."
He waved the hand that was resting on her waist. "Beside the point. You still owe me." Then, his hand drifting higher and a lascivious grin sliding across his face, "I have a few ideas for how you can repay me, though…"
"You have one idea," she scoffed, pushing his hand away. "The same idea you always have."
The grin didn't waver. "Don't hear you complaining…" Well, she certainly intended to. Definitely. Just as soon as he stopped kissing her.
Only problem was, he didn't stop. He just kept on kissing her, and now there were other body parts involved as well, and as she lay there, tangled up with him, listening to the rain drumming on the roof, feeling his cool skin against hers, she could feel whatever had been tearing loose inside her earlier dangling by a thread. One more kiss, one more caress, and she'd be lost. She pulled back before her brain could shut down completely.
Spike looked at her, and she could see the questions and hurt beginning behind the haze of lust in his eyes. Clearly, he thought this was the preface to another of her dramatic exits. She wanted to reassure him, but as usual, she struggled with the words.
"This… it's so much," she said finally, softly. She swallowed, looked down, then back up at him. "It scares me."
He breathed a mental sigh of relief that she seemed to be showing no sign of the patented Buffy Summers Insult and Exeunt, but the mixture of fear and defiance in her expression caught him off guard. "Me too," he told her with a kind of determined honesty, momentarily stripped of his defenses.
Her eyes were huge. "Things could suck tomorrow."
He nodded. "Or later today. Or even five minutes from now." Despite the seriousness of the situation, he couldn't quite resist the smirk. "Well, maybe twenty-five minutes from now," he amended, and was rewarded with a blush and a tiny smile. I can still make her smile. There's some hope, then. "No use trying to predict the future, love. You do what you need to do, and deal with the consequences as they come."
She pouted a little. "I like to plan. I'm a planner."
"And I like to enjoy the ride." The double-entendre was there, of course--he was, after all, him--but she could see that he meant it. The ridiculousness of it all suddenly hit her, and she began to laugh.
"It's so… wrong," she managed, between gusts of laughter. "We're nothing alike, we've tried to kill each other, we'll never go a day without arguing, and somehow, still, we… balance. How is that?" She shook her head, totally at a loss.
Spike just watched her laugh, this tangled, infinitely complex web of dark and light who was the Slayer, who was Buffy, and thought about the exquisite pain of loving her. She looked whole for the first time in a long time. It occurred to him that he might have a little bit to do with that. He grinned into her tired/amused eyes.
"Fate's a bitch, pet. I think she and Love must be sisters."
His tepid attempt at armchair--or mattress--philosophy only made her laugh harder. She flapped one hand helplessly, though he knew better than to believe she was ever helpless. "Stop… with the… talking… God, I'm so sick of talking…"
Well, if that wasn't an invitation, he didn't know what was. Her laugh slid into a sigh as his mouth moved along her jawline, down her throat, where he could feel the blood pumping beneath her skin. Even though he'd done it a hundred times, it still drove him to the edge of control, and suddenly he felt her stiffen under him. She put one hand on his shoulder, pushing him back. She looked steadily into his eyes for a moment before slowly, deliberately turning her head to the side.
Offering.
Spike's mouth went dry, and his borrowed blood heated with the heady combination of lust and hunger and adrenaline. She stared at the wall, and he could hear her heart pounding, see her pulse racing. He found he couldn't move.
What the fuck are you doing? Buffy's brain was screaming at her, while her Slayer instincts shifted into overdrive, crying out for her to grab the nearest stake and finish this. But whatever anchor she'd been clinging to was gone, and she found herself overwhelmed with the irrational need to give him something, to prove something to him, to atone somehow for all the ways she'd been wrong. In some indefinable way, the situation, their relationship, seemed to call for something extreme, and this was the most extreme thing she could imagine, lying there waiting for him to drink the blood that was rushing frantically in her veins.
Spike just kept staring at her, smelling her fear and uncertainty, floored by this profound statement of trust from the woman who swore she'd never trust him. Never does anything halfway, does she? he thought fuzzily. Not just accepting the demon in him, but inviting it, though it obviously shook her to her core. No one, not even Dru with her dark, deadly kiss of salvation, had ever offered him a gift like that. He wanted to give her something in return, give her everything, to atone for everything he'd done wrong in his desperate, hopeless pursuit of her. But he wanted to take, too, and the conflict held him utterly still, teetering on the brink.
Finally, when he didn't move, she snaked a hand up his arm, pulled his head down to her neck. And shuddered as he bit down. With blunt, human teeth.
"I would've…" she whispered, shaking with tension, wondering why there were suddenly tears in her eyes.
"I know," he soothed, his mind and body and heart all swimming with the effort of refusing her. He honestly hadn't had any idea what he was going to do until she pulled him down to her, and then he'd remembered like a bolt of lightning: balance, she'd said. They balanced. So he'd chosen the only way he could think of to acknowledge her nature as she'd acknowledged his. And despite his firm conviction that he held the all-time world record for Most Well-Intentioned Actions that Got Completely Bollocksed Up, he had a feeling as she kissed him that this one time, anyway, he'd made the right decision. But the strain had shattered his control, and he channeled all the heat and hunger into touching her, wanting to be closer, always closer…
She felt his hands growing more insistent, gripping harder, but the tears were clogging the back of her throat now. She pulled back again, and his eyes were naked as he choked out a breathless laugh.
"Stop-and-go traffic's hell on the engine, luv," he managed hoarsely.
She smiled, and if she'd dared put a name to what wrapped itself around her heart at that moment, she might have called it love. "I want to show you something."
He raised an eyebrow. His body was pretty much insisting on "immediately if not sooner," but still… Never let it be said that William the Bloody turned down a sex game. "All right."
She flipped him over on his back with practiced ease, straddling him, sending another shot of lust straight to his groin. He grinned in anticipation, distantly trying to remember where he'd packed the handcuffs. But she didn't appear to need any props--just leaned down until he could feel her warm breath on his ear.
"I love what we do," she told him, beginning a small trail of feather-light kisses down his neck. "I love what you've shown me." Her mouth drifted along his shoulder, then his chest, punctuating each word. "But I wanted to show you something I know…" She stopped, and looked up at him. The cocky self-assurance on his face was slowly melting into a kind of bemused fear. They were in uncharted territory now. She cupped a hand to his cheek, wondering again at how such a powerful creature could look so vulnerable, and leaned down till her mouth was centimeters from his. "This… it doesn't always have to hurt."
And she kissed him, gently but thoroughly, trying to pour into it everything she wasn't brave enough to admit to herself yet, much less to him. Spike wasn't sure whether he was tasting her tears or his as he speculated on the real possibility of dying of this strange combination of happiness and terror. Not a bad way to go, he reflected distantly, and held her tighter as outside, the rain poured from a sunny sky.
END
A/N, Part II: Thanks to everyone who made it this far, and who came back even after the looooong hiatus. (Just trying to be more like the show, you know.) I hope you enjoyed it. Your feedback has made my day on any number of occasions, so thank you for taking the time—I hate to single anyone out, because any review is awesome, but I wanted to especially thank Tigress Eve, kreepyk, Beautiful Wednesday, Lynn, Forgotten by Love, Chosen-Chick, and of course Nevermore, God of Reviews (and, in happier times, a fine and prolific fic writer himself! hint hint), not to mention anyone else who's taken the time to leave multiple reviews of not only this story but my other fics as well. You guys keep me checking my computer obsessively at work. And now that I'm done with this damn thing I'll have time to do more reading and hopefully return the favor, if I haven't already. So thanks… and pray for a satisfying end to this season. I hear Joss is at the helm again. Have faith. : )