Last time: Willow, Xander, and Giles wanted Buffy to use a truth potion on Spike to see if he could be trusted. Buffy met Spike at the Bronze and decided to go ahead with the plan.

*****

Buffy maintained a careful hold on the drinks, being sure to keep track of which one contained the potion. According to Willow's instructions, all she had to do was get it to Spike, wait until he drank it, and then ask him any questions she wanted with a guarantee of receiving honest responses. It seemed like such an easy assignment, as long as she kept the emotional aspect out of it. Like, how Spike would feel if he realized what she had done. But Buffy firmly blocked that thought from her mind, determined to go through with the plan.

She proceeded back to the table and handed Spike the glass in her right hand. "There you go. Drink up." Buffy then sat down and gulped half of her drink before pausing. Spike, however, hadn't taken the hint, and his glass remained untouched in front of him. "Don't you like Coke?"

"It's fine." As Buffy watched, Spike picked up the glass and took a few swallows.

'Keep going,' she mentally urged him. The sooner he finished it off, the sooner the potion would kick in and she would be able to uncover the truth. Then she probably wouldn't have a single reason to feel guilty. Actually, by the time she was finished she would probably have at least a dozen solid reasons to be grateful she'd gone through with the scheme. Over the next 15 minutes, Buffy made idle chatter and practically willed Spike to finish up the drink. When he finally did, she breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Spike looked sharply at her. "What's that about?"

"Nothing," Buffy said quickly. "Nothing at all."

The band onstage started to play a new song. "Want to dance?" Spike suggested.

"No, I'm a little tired," Buffy lied. "Long day at school and all that. Can we just talk?"

"Sure."

Spike seemed perfectly satisfied with that suggestion, and Buffy's hopes rose. If she could start slowly by asking him a relatively innocent question, she should be able to tell if the potion had taken effect and move on to the more pressing issues. She began with a mild enough mention of an event from earlier that same day. "I was surprised to find out you were a poet, Spike. It doesn't seem like a very vamp-like hobby."

He looked away. "I'd rather not talk about it."

"But I want to know more," Buffy pressed.

Though he still appeared reluctant to discuss the topic, Spike gave in. "I started back when I was a human. Wrote the most bloody awful poetry you could ever imagine. It's embarrassing even to think about it."

"The one you wrote in comp class was nice," Buffy pointed out.

Spike shook his head. "It didn't say what I wanted it to, but I keep practicing. Might get there someday."

"Bet you wanted to kill Dr. Petrovski for reading it in front of the entire class. And I mean literally kill, not figuratively."

"Yeah. I could almost taste the blood flowing down my throat," Spike rhapsodized, a dreamy look on his face. "It would have been delicious--hot and rich and strong."

That settled it; the potion was working. Spike wouldn't have dared to be so straightforward otherwise, considering that he'd been making every effort to hide his cold-blooded, murderous side from Buffy. Satisfied, she jumped ahead to the most vital subject--the issue of Spike's invincibility. "So, going back to those memorable, not-so-long-ago days when I wanted nothing more than to stake you out of existence, there's something I want to know. It made no sense that I wasn't able to dust you that day in the woods when I found out you were back in town. I definitely tried hard enough. Let's face it, you shouldn't have been able to survive both the staking and the sun. How'd you do it?"

"Gem of Amara," Spike promptly replied.

"Giles mentioned that possibility," Buffy recalled. "But you haven't been wearing a ring or any other jewelry that I can see, and we figured that couldn't be the answer. So where *is* this gem?"

Spike pointed to his chest. "Inside here. All it took was an incision and tucking it away. I'm not stupid, you know. If I wore the ring on one of my fingers, all anyone would have to do is pull it straight off to defeat me. But no one would ever guess it's buried in me."

'Clever,' Buffy acknowledged to herself. Of course, now that she knew the truth, Spike's plot was shot to pieces. Not giving him the slightest insight into her thoughts, she continued. "There's another thing about you that surprised me. The average vampire--all right, every single other vampire except Angel--wants to kill me, but you say you're in love with me. How did that come about? Did you just wake up one day and say, 'Hey, I'm in love with the Slayer and I have to go send her anonymous gifts to soften her up'?"

"It didn't go down that way," Spike answered. "Actually, Drusilla tipped me off. It wasn't exactly the news I wanted to hear at the time, but she was right."

"You haven't had any doubts? No second guessing, even when I tried to stake you, and told you to go away, and threatened you?"

"We're meant to be together. I know it, and you do, too. Even if you won't admit it yet."

Spike was unshakable in his faith. He truly did love her. Buffy took a moment to absorb that knowledge and her feelings of guilt resurfaced with a vengeance, until she thought of a question Spike was sure to blow. He had already told her he hadn't been killing, but he'd made that claim prior to taking the truth potion. His answer post-potion was bound to be much different. "Spike, the fact remains, you're a vampire. You kill people. You must have drained dozens since you came back to Sunnydale."

Spike shook his head. "Like I said before, not even one. I've fantasized about it, but that's different from the doing of it. And it's possible to drink without killing, you know. Most of us vamps don't bother to restrain ourselves, but we can."

"And you have?"

"Well, yeah." Spike's tone implied that his answer was the only possible one.

"But what about all your minions? Where did they come from?"

Spike shrugged. "Strays who needed a leader. Dime a dozen. I don't need to bother to turn anyone. Plenty of other vamps do it for me."

Again, Buffy felt that uncomfortably crushing sensation of guilt. She attempted to shrug it off, though, and asked, "Why have you held off on the killing, when it's in your nature?"

"'Cause every time I went out to hunt I thought about how you would feel if I offed a human, and I couldn't bring myself to do it."

Wow. She was seriously influencing Spike. Who knew? Still... "It can't be quite that simple. I bet you'd like to kill Xander sometimes, for instance."

"Of course I would. What self-respecting vampire wouldn't? That idiot is one of the most annoying, self-righteous twits I have ever had the misfortune to know. But he's also your friend and you would be upset if he died, so it's fangs off no matter how much I dislike him. Your other friends are all right, though, for humans."

"You don't mean any harm to me or them?"

"Haven't done any yet, have I? Won't in the future, either. Are you forgetting how I helped save the bunch of them at the Halloween party?"

No, she hadn't forgotten. Buffy had to face the facts: Spike was telling the truth, and she and the rest of the gang had seriously misjudged him. She couldn't help feeling sick to her stomach at the thought.

*****

Spike violently shook his head and struggled to pull himself together. He felt like he was coming out of a fog. The last thing he knew, he had been at the Bronze. And then his memories blurred. He looked across the table at Buffy. They were still in the Bronze, and she was pale and shaken. In fact, she looked like she was about to throw up.

Before he could become too concerned about her condition, Spike slowly, steadily began to recall all the probing questions she had asked him. At the time, it had seemed so natural to give complete, honest answers, but now it felt so wrong. He wouldn't willingly have told her all about the Gem of Amara. Not yet, when Buffy still so obviously didn't completely trust him and the truth could lead to his downfall. But he had. Without any logical reason.

Only one likely possibility came to mind: The Slayer had somehow tricked him into giving away his secrets. She had been using him all along, pretending to be nice just to worm information out of him. Spike stared straight at her and saw realization dawn in her eyes. She knew that he knew, and she was bracing herself for his reaction.