Heal Me
Part 3
By Gem
Buffy blinked a few times as her jaw worked up and down, trying to wrap both mind and lips around the unexpected name.
"Cordelia?" she finally choked out. "Cordelia Chase?"
"The one and only," Angel said lightly, and hated himself a moment later for his flippancy.
"But that's not pos..." she sputtered. "It just doesn't make sen...Cordy?"
Her tone begged for a denial, but Angel could only offer reluctant confirmation.
"Yes, Cordy."
"Oh this is just way too weird even by my standards...and this is Return From the Dead Girl talking." She blew a hissing sigh between her teeth. "I mean, sure, Darla pulls her dust together and gets pregnant after she becomes a vampire for the second time; that I can buy. But you and Cordy?" Her voice rose to an indignant squeak.
"Buffy, she's not the same person you remember," he said defensively. "She's been a really good friend to me the past few years, especially since Connor was born."
"How good?" she snapped.
"Not...like that," he answered uncomfortably. In at least one instance, he knew it hadn't been for lack of trying. "But she's known me long enough to know when she can push, and when to back off, and some of my...quirkier...habits don't faze her. That takes a lot of the stress off of me trying to fit in." He shrugged helplessly. "She's...I don't know...familiar. Safe."
"Safe?" she repeated incredulously. "The girl who called herself the slayer of the dating world?"
"And how long ago was that, Buffy?" He cocked an eyebrow at her, as though he really expected an answer. "You've barely talked to her in the last three years. People grow up. They change."
She drew one shaky breath, and then another, trying to hold back the unexpected wave of jealousy surging through her veins. All right, she admitted, it wasn't totally unexpected, not the jealousy part anyway. She had always been a little possessive when it came to Angel. But it had been a long time since she'd thought Cordelia posed any threat.
"Maybe I shouldn't have even brought it up," he continued, "but...I wanted to be honest with you."
"Yeah, well, gotta love that honesty thing. It's always worked out so well for us in the past," she reminded him with a grimace.
Angel stubbornly shook his head. "It's the only way we'll get a future," he insisted.
A future; he wanted a future. With her. Not with Cordelia, but with her. Buffy hung on to that idea with all her slayer strength, holding it as counterweight against almost every other damning word coming from her beloved's mouth.
"You said she didn't believe you," she prompted, now looking for some positive aspect of the situation, if such a thing actually existed. "Did she...she didn't laugh, did she? Because I might have to hurt her if she...wait, why am I defending you?" She waited a beat. "And...do I need to defend you?"
He shook his head again, still sporting that mystified little half-smirk that was starting to annoy her. He seemed to actually find something amusing in this whole disaster, though for the life of her Buffy couldn't see what that might be.
"She didn't laugh, but she did think I was joking at first," he admitted. "Then she thought I was crazy. But when I told her about...about the last time I saw you...she knew."
Buffy's eyes narrowed as she pulled her hands free of Angel's clasp. "How much did you tell her?"
"Not details," he hastily assured her. "Mostly it was just how I felt...when you didn't believe my soul was secure."
"You know why I didn't!" she protested. Suddenly she couldn't sit still one minute longer; she stood up and began to rapidly pace back and forth in front of the stone bench. "It had nothing to do with you; it was me."
"And I know that now, but not then. You wouldn't talk to me," he reminded her. "I spent the whole drive down to meet you planning our future, because curse or no curse I wasn't going to let you go ever again; I couldn't."
He reached out a hand and caught her arm as she strode past, swinging her around to face him.
"But you never gave me a chance to say half the things I wanted to say," Angel continued, "and then when I tried to tell you the curse obviously wasn't an issue, you didn't believe me. I understand now, but at the time it..." he looked blindly at the moonlit graveyard, seeing only visions of the past, "it felt like you didn't want it to be real...that once we really could be together, you didn't want to be."
"Like I didn't?" she flared, yanking her arm free. "Who left who?"
"That was a long time ago, and I still think I did the right thing. We both needed time to find more strength within ourselves before we could be any good to each other."
"And this all somehow led you to a mad passion for Cordelia?" She smacked her hand to her head and choked out a harsh laugh. "And I thought it was bad enough that I slept with Spike. At least I never pretended I loved him."
"I never made love to Cordelia," he said steadily, forcing down any comments about the debatable virtue of sex without love. "I never even tried to...at least not as me. There was this one time with the ghosts of two...never mind; it's not important."
"Maybe I should be the judge of that." Buffy tossed her head, but the effect was just not the same with her shorter hair, leaving her no physical way to express her distaste but to stalk back and forth like an agitated lioness.
"I'm sorry if you're angry with me, but I haven't done anything I'm ashamed of." Angel paused, and then reconsidered his statement. "Except maybe for trying to use a friend as an easy way out of being lonely. You tell yourself that you're reaching out to someone, and that's a good thing. A healthy thing."
His dark eyes followed every restless movement of Buffy's body as he puzzled out his motivations for both of their sakes. He needed to understand all this almost as badly as she did.
"Trouble is, what you're really doing is hiding behind them so the rest of the world will stop...expecting...things from you once they can't single you out from the crowd."
Buffy abruptly flung herself back down onto the bench, her burgeoning anger deflated by his last words. This was all so confusing and...wrong. All she had wanted was to share her life with Angel, and instead they had ended up living almost the same life in two different cities.
"Well I wouldn't call Spike a friend by any stretch of the dictionary," she grudgingly allowed, "but I suppose I can't say I did much better." She laughed sharply. "And we won't even touch on the Riley subject."
"Buffy, no. I mean, yes...but no." Angel was forced to stop and regroup, watching her with deep concern as he searched for the right words to express himself. "I mean yes...probably...with Riley. But Spike? That's not even close. You didn't use Spike; if anything, he used you."
"You weren't there; you didn't see."
"But I know you," he insisted. "Look, I know you weren't raised as a Catholic, but do you know why the Church considers suicide a mortal sin?"
She shook her head, her brow furrowing as she tried to see the parallel he was drawing.
"A suicide is supposed to be prompted by despair," he explained. "Despair, in Church terms, is when you abandon all hope of salvation and turn your back on everything you believe in, on God himself."
"Herself," she automatically corrected.
He waved away the technicalities. "When Willow brought you back, and you had to face the loss of heaven, and your mother, and all the dreams of the future that you'd hung onto for so long...you despaired. And Spike saw that, and he took advantage of it for his own reasons."
Angel didn't bother to delve into Spike's reasons; he'd known his wayward childe long enough to guess at most of them, and none of them stacked up against the damage he'd done to Buffy.
"Angel, it wasn't easy for me to face what I was doing with Spike, but I did it." Buffy took a deep breath, reminding herself that it was, at least and at last, all in the past. "Our...whatever you want to call it...was ugly and stupid and self-destructive, and I admit a part of me knew that all along; I just...didn't care enough about myself to stop, I guess. But you're taking something away from what I've learned if you make it out like it was all his fault." She leaned forward and looked intently into his eyes. "I messed up. Me. Not only me...but me."
He didn't want to believe that; he wanted so badly for it to be all some manipulation of Spike's. He knew the larger part of it was, but he wanted the vampire to be completely to blame. If he wasn't the only one at fault, then Angel had to admit that at least a little of the light and innocence he had hoped to preserve for his beloved by leaving, she had sacrificed of her own free will.
"It's just hard for me to admit that..."
"That I'm not perfect?" she broke in. "I know; quite the shocker, isn't it?" She shrugged and smiled at the sad truth. "Look, it doesn't matter anyway whose fault the Spike disaster was. What matters to me right now is that you," she could barely make herself say it, "fell in love with Cordelia."
"I never said that; I said I managed to convince myself I did." He risked reaching out to take her hand in his; to his relief she let him. "And without even knowing it, you made me realize I'd been an idiot."
"I never said that," she quickly pointed out in turn.
"You didn't have to." He felt something loosen in his chest; suddenly he felt freer for the honesty that now lay between them, painful though it had been, and still was. "It was written all over your face, and even the dark can't hide your face from me."
"And does my face also tell you where we're supposed to go from here?" she asked ruefully. "Or should we go raid the Magic Box for tea leaves?"
"Where do you want to go from here?" he asked carefully, hoping he already knew the answer.
She was silent for a moment, trying to marshal the courage to ask a very important question one last time. Perhaps now, after so much dirty laundry had been aired, she would get the complete response.
"Why did you really come tonight, Angel?"
"I asked you first," he said quickly.
"Angel, please, just tell me," she begged. "No sweet nothings necessary this time; no ego boosts or lollipops for the emotionally damaged, just a straight answer. Why?"
He didn't want to do this now. The worst had been said, and apparently forgiven; couldn't the fine points wait for a later time?
"I told you; I wanted to set things straight between us."
"Because you wanted to clean up the past before you started over with Cordy," Buffy wearily corrected him. "That was the real reason, wasn't it?"
Reluctantly, he surrendered to the inevitable.
"I thought so when I started out," he answered quietly. "I've gotten pretty good at fooling myself, or maybe I was just always gifted that way. But when I look at you...everything else just falls away." He couldn't help his gentle chuckle. "I know everyone always thinks I can't see straight when it comes to you, but the truth is that being with you, or even the thought of being with you, makes everything crystal clear."
"That makes one of us," she sighed.
"Why do you think I try to stay away from you, Buffy?" He traced the line of her jaw with one cool fingertip. "It's not because you cloud my thoughts; it's because I can see everything so well, and sometimes that scares the hell out of me."
To any other woman it might not have sounded romantic, but to Buffy it was poetry. Still, experience had taught her to look for the cloud wrapped around the silver lining.
"And what happens when you go back to LA? Because you will go back; you have to. We both know that."
"That's what I want to know too. I was ready to commit myself to you months ago, when I first found out you were alive again. And as much as I've tried to pretend I got over that idea, I never really gave it up. Not in here." He lightly thumped his fist against his chest. "Do you remember what I said to you the night of your birthday?"
She nodded; there was no need to ask which birthday.
"I love you," he confessed, as he had that rainy night so many years ago. "I try not to...but I can't stop."
She should have been thinking of Cordelia, of Connor, of Dawn, of her duties and his, but in this moment all she could think of was that night, and this man. Everything had seemed possible for them then, and for some crazy reason he still believed it could be possible now. No matter what, or who, had passed between them in the meantime, she could still give no other answer than the one she had offered the night of her 17th birthday.
"I can't either," she whispered, leaning over to kiss him.
She'd had a lot more experience in kissing since the last time they were together; she'd had a lot more experience in a lot of things she wasn't too anxious to tell him about. But the way Buffy felt when Angel's arms were wound around her, and his chest pressed hard against her own, and his lips softly moved against hers...none of that had anything to do with any man she'd ever known but him.
With Spike, even with Riley, it had all been about the physical sensation. She'd tried so hard to sublimate the pain in her heart with other pleasurable sensations. But with Angel there was no question of diversion, only of a slow and merciful healing.
* * * * *
Angel broke the kiss at last, when he dimly perceived that Buffy's labored breaths had become less a matter of passion and more a matter of oxygen- deprivation. He couldn't bear to release her so soon, however, and even as she buried her head in his shoulder he continued to worship the tender skin at the juncture of her neck and shoulder.
"You're cold," he murmured against her throat. "We should go back."
"Not yet," she protested, wrapping her arms tighter around his chest. "Back is...bad. Responsibilities...sacred duties...nosy sisters. Bad."
He chuckled, blowing a puff of cool air against her suddenly overheated skin as he nuzzled behind her ear. "I have to check on Connor sometime," he reminded her. "And you have no coat."
She sighed and pulled back slightly in his embrace, just far enough to allow her to look at him. A shaft of moonlight broke through the passing clouds and silvered the dark spikes of his hair. Below, his face glowed dimly, every feature already etched on her heart beyond the need for eyes to verify.
"You're supposed to give me yours," she pointed out, smiling at the memory.
"Sorry; took off too fast to grab it."
The unintentional reminder of her flight into the night succeeded in dampening Buffy's romantic ardor where the chill evening air had failed. After she carefully slid her legs off of Angel's, she cupped his pale face in her hands. She needed to look into his eyes as she made her apology; she needed to know that he absorbed every word so he would know her escape had nothing to do with him.
"I shouldn't have run out like that; I'm the one who's sorry. I was handling the idea of Connor, and I think I could have taken the Spike talk, but when you explained about the magick being permanent...and changing me...I, umm, freaked."
"I really thought Giles would have explained by now." He could kick himself for not making sure of his facts beforehand; he would never forget the devastation in her eyes when she learned the change was permanent.
"He probably figured I wouldn't take it too well," she suggested, laughing sharply. "Can't imagine where he'd get that idea."
"Buffy, it really doesn't make you anything less. You're more now, something extra. And you can use that something extra to help you stay alive." He clasped his hands over hers against his cheeks. "We need you to do that."
She didn't ask him to explain who 'we' was; there was only one true 'we' in Angel's life right now, and hopefully the other half of it was sound asleep by now in the arms of Auntie Dawn. It gave Buffy a warm glow that Angel fit her so effortlessly into the picture, though it still didn't change her problem.
"I'm not planning on going anywhere soon, Angel, but I wish I knew more about the me that I'm turning into while I'm here." Her hands fell away from his face, balling up into fists as they descended to her lap. "I mean I've seen what magick can do to you, the damage it can cause if you let it too deep under your skin. And yet you're telling me it's already under mine whether I like it or not, and it's only going to get worse. That scares me."
"It's not the physical part that's worrying you, is it?" he guessed shrewdly. "You still think there's something wrong with your soul, even though the magick is really only affecting your body."
"You say it's just my body," she said, "but how can you be sure? You said this magick gave me prophetic dreams; what, are they supposed to come from eating a certain type of cheese doodle or something? There has to be something in my soul too. And it's getting bigger."
She bit her lip and reached up to twist a lock of her hair around her fingers as Angel struggled to find the wisdom he needed to help her cope. He wanted to offer a hug and a kiss to make everything all better, but the only one that truly worked on was Connor. She needed more than love, and she needed more than words.
"Come on," he said, getting to his feet. He held his hand down in front of her bemused face. "Come on," Angel repeated with a hint of his old cryptic smile. "I'm not getting any older, but you're not getting any younger. Let's go."
She sighed; obviously romance was already taking a back seat to child-care.
"You're right." She reluctantly stood up. "Connor needs his daddy and Dawn probably needs a teenager's version of Valium right now - a pint of Cherry Garcia and a spoon."
"Actually I had something a little less domestic in mind." He checked his watch. "You gave Spike the boot about an hour ago, so I estimate Willie is already serving him his third shot of Bushmill's and blood right about now." Angel noticed her involuntary shudder. "Oh, sorry; I guess I'm kind of used to talking about the blood thing now. I didn't think..."
"No, it's not that," she said quickly, resting her hand on his arm as she gazed earnestly up into his eyes. "It's the whiskey...I really have bad memories...that is I really have really fuzzy bad memories...of whiskey and Spike and, umm, gambling for kittens. Not me gambling," she added hastily. "I was, well, I was a little too busy with the whiskey...hence the peach fuzz on those memories."
"He was gambling for...never mind." He shook his head sharply as he slipped his hand around hers. "We're going to find him, and prop him up if necessary, and let him take a swing at me. Then we can go home and..."
"Wait, no," she interrupted. "Angel, why? Why let him take a swing at you? Shouldn't you be doing the swinging?" She was grateful for the dim light of the cloud-covered moon as she felt a flush steal over her cheeks. Even so, she glanced away as she asked, "Not that I want to be fought over or anything, but isn't that...isn't that how it's done?"
Angel kept one hand firmly wrapped around hers, and with the other he gently turned her face towards him. "I have no need to fight over you; you're a big girl and you make your own choices. But I do need to prove to you that Spike can hit a not-entirely human body with a very human soul inside, and not feel anything but glee."
* * * * *
She stared at him and blinked her eyes for a few times, but he still didn't go 'poof' or turn into a giant electrical bill. He was real, not a dream, and thus what she just heard was also real.
"You're going to let Spike take a swing at you to prove there's nothing wrong with me?" she asked slowly. "Angel, that's...that's sweet, it really is. But, umm, how exactly will that prove anything about me? I mean, you and I are alike in a lot of ways, but physically," she glanced down at her body skeptically, "we're kind of not at all."
"And trust me, I'm not complaining." His teasing tone only lasted a moment, however. "Look, my body was human too, once upon a time. I admit it was upon a long time, but in some ways my body is still human; it just functions a little differently because of the demon inside me."
"As in, that's why it still functions," she said gently.
"Because I have something extra in me," he agreed. "But my soul is human; nothing very special."
"Now there we definitely disagree."
He couldn't resist pressing a quick kiss to her forehead for that comment. Actually he would have preferred aiming a little lower on her face, but he didn't want to get distracted from his purpose.
"If Spike can hit me, with my human-plus body and human soul, and he doesn't feel any pain, won't that convince you that the only reason he can hit you now is because the magick used to resurrect you changed your body somehow?"
She considered the question from all angles, coming to a grinding halt at one particular outcome. "And what if he does feel pain?"
Angel smiled crookedly at her. "Then your soul is even more special than I remembered."
"What am I going to do with you?" she asked, pretending his answer exasperated her rather than making her knees shake. "No matter what I say, you're going to stand there and let Spike take a poke at you and not even defend yourself just to..."
"I didn't say I wouldn't defend myself." Angel's tender smile turned a little colder as he interrupted her. His anger was under control, but only time would smooth the sharp edges that cut into his soul. "I'll let him get his punch in, but I can't very well let him get away without getting mine in as well."
"Angel."
He shrugged and feigned innocence. "It wouldn't be safe for him to get the reputation of being able to take me down. My name still carries a certain...cachet...among the demon community. If it got out that Spike beat me, he'd be facing more trouble than he can handle." A wicked grin lit his eyes. "It wouldn't be fair to him."
"You're all heart," she drawled, but her own eyes shone like twin sparklers a minute later as an opportunity occurred to her. "Ooo, if you get to punch Spike, does that mean I can take a swing at Cordy? I'll even let her go first."
Angel's gloating expression fast became a frown as he gazed sternly down at his beloved. "No, we're going to leave Cordelia out of this. She didn't do anything to come on to me, Buffy; I made up the whole relationship myself based on the time we spent together."
"If that's supposed to make me not want to punch her," Buffy shook her head, "then you still have a lot to learn about women."
He cocked his head to the side; trying to think of the best way to explain a madness he was still grappling to understand himself.
"For a hundred years, the only human emotions I knew were guilt and shame. But after spending the last six years loving you, I feel so much I can't always keep all the emotions straight. I got confused." Angel paused for an instant to emphasize his coda. "She didn't."
"Oh, all right," she grumbled, "I guess I can live without punching her lights out...even if now I'm kind of mad she thought there was something wrong with having you like her. I mean there was," she added hastily, not wanting to give him any ideas. "But that's for me to say, not Cordelia."
"Can we just go find Spike?" Angel pleaded. "It's way past Connor's bedtime, and I'm not sure if he'll go down without his usual routine."
"I suppose," she sighed, slipping her arm through his. "But you know a bar fight really loses something when it has to be finished up before night- nights."
* * * * *
Spike pushed the empty shot glass across the bar, already impatient for Willie to finish serving the two Charleth demons at the far end. He'd asked for the bottle, both bottles actually, but Willie didn't trust demons not to use the libations as weapons, and the little human hated cleaning blood up off the floor. So here he sat, William the Bloody, waiting for a human to give a damn that he was thirsty. Waiting for a human to give a damn that he was all alone. Waiting for a certain human to realize she'd made the biggest mistake of what was going to be a bloody short life and come crawling back to him, begging for his forgiveness. Not that he'd give it, of course; she didn't deserve it. But how he wanted to hear that begging.
"Willie!" he barked, suddenly reduced to a bit of begging himself. "Can't you see when a man's thirsty, damn you?"
"And just what would that have to do with you?" asked a voice from a few feet behind him.
Spike closed his eyes and shook his head. Simply marvelous. As though the night hadn't been bad enough already, now Angelus was crowding him out of his chosen refuge. No, wait; he'd already done that earlier tonight. Now he was going for Spike's last refuge.
"What's the matter, Spike? Chip got your tongue?"
Spike spun around on the bar stool, realizing an instant too late that he should have opened his eyes first. The world continued on a sickening slide even after his feet slammed down to stop the rotation, and he had all he could do to keep his liquid solace from making a return trip up his esophagus.
"Angel! Slayer!" Willie called out anxiously, scurrying back to Spike's end of the bar. "Hey, long time no see, my friend. How's the big city treating you? Bet you haven't found any establishments as fine as this one...though if you have I'm sure you treat them and their patrons...and their owners...with the utmost respect and..."
"Relax, Willie," Angel drawled. "We're not here to make trouble; we just want to settle a little...dispute."
"You know, they have these things called courthouses," Willie said quickly. "What you do is you get yourself a lawyer and you...did you just growl? Because I don't think I've ever heard you growl before and..."
"Do not mention lawyers," Angel snapped, his calm momentarily deserting him.
Buffy laid her hand on his arm, squeezing it in silent warning. "It's kind of a sore subject," she told Willie.
Angel took a deep breath and focused his attention once again on the issue at hand: Spike.
"I'm just here to ask my friend Spike a favor." Angel tried to keep his tone light and unthreatening, but he couldn't help the bitterness that welled up into the last few words.
"Sure, mate; what ya' need?" Spike could feel his head beginning to clear already, from the combined forces of anger and his vampiric constitution. Still, it wouldn't hurt to play the drunken sot a bit longer to keep his sire off guard. "You've already taken my girl; need to borrow my crypt too? She kind of likes the cold stone against her..."
His final words were cut off by a hand on his throat, but it was not Angel's fingers that flattened his windpipe and drove Spike to his knees. Buffy leaned in very close, her breath flowing sweetly over his face as she whispered in the ear that wasn't being jammed against the edge of the bar.
"If you stop with the gutter mouth this minute, you might not end up clogging one up the next time it rains." She stepped back, releasing his throat, though he could see she was poised to strike again if she believed it warranted. "Now we need you to settle a little argument for us. Do it, and we can all walk out of here tonight."
Spike rubbed his throat ostentatiously as he got to his feet. "What kind of favor are we talking about?"
"Punch me."
It was not the reply Spike had been expecting from Angel.
"You want me to do what?" Spike pounded his fist against his ear. "Must be going deaf in my old age. I thought you were inviting me to have a whack at you."
Angel crossed his arms over his chest, fixing his errant progeny in his cold gaze. "I am. One punch." He held up his index finger. "One."
Spike nodded sagely, now onto their game. "Sure, and then Little Miss Death Warmed Over will pop out a stake and I'll be soot on the peanut shells before I can pull my fist back."
Buffy raised her hands in the air, showing Spike her empty palms. "No stakes; I promise." The hands came down as she clarified her position. "This is, however, a one-time deal. As soon as we walk out of this bar tonight, we're back to the old rules: you touch him and you die. Painfully."
"Come on, Spike. Time's a wasting." Angel tapped his foot impatiently. "Buffy's promised not to stake you, and I won't even hit back. You get one good punch, no strings attached. What do you have to lose?"
"You won't hit back? Am I supposed to believe that?"
"Up to you." Angel shrugged; he preferred to remain noncommittal on this point, but he had no qualms about lying if that was what it would take to ensure Spike's cooperation. "But you heard Buffy; it's a one-time offer. Take the chance now or lose it forever."
Spike didn't believe a word of it. There was a trick hidden somewhere in the offer; he was sure of it. But by now the whole bar was watching the floorshow, waiting to see him back down. Either way he was screwed, and these were the demons he had to face every day, unlike the ringer from out of town. Keeping that thought firmly in mind, he slowly stood up and aimed his fist at Angel's nose. Even though the injury wouldn't last long, he wanted to make sure it was a disgusting one.
The punch was swift, and harder than Angel had expected, given Spike's inebriated condition. The older vampire rocked back on his heels from the force of the blow as the pain shot through his nerve endings and screamed all the way up to his brain.
Buffy only had eyes for Spike.
"Did that hurt?" she asked anxiously, all but x-raying his face with her burning eyes.
Spike couldn't help but smile, despite the pain in his hand. "Thought you didn't care?" he murmured, chafing his reddened fingers with his other palm. Fingers reddened with Angel's blood, but Buffy still didn't seem to be concerned about that factor.
"Your head, idiot," she snapped. "Did that hurt your head?"
Spike reached up to touch his skull, momentarily puzzled by her question, and by the growing coldness in her voice. "I hit him with my fist, luv, not with my head. That won't hurt till the whiskey wears off."
Buffy slowly turned to face Angel, a small smile teasing at the corners of her mouth. "Guess you're pretty proud of yourself."
Angel slid his long arm past her to grab a cocktail napkin from the end of the bar. "I'm not sure 'pride' is the word for it," he admitted ruefully as he gingerly pressed the napkin to his nose.
Spike was completely baffled when Buffy threw her arms around Angel's neck, heedless of the blood dripping out of his nose once she'd pushed his arm, and the napkin, aside. Angel's arms automatically came up again, but to hold her fast, not push her away.
"Thank you," she whispered into her lover's neck. "You didn't have to...but thank you."
"I'd say this was worth a bloody nose," he murmured, brushing his cheek against the soft curtain of her hair before he reluctantly let her go. "But since I seem to be dripping that blood onto your shoulder, maybe we better save this for a little later."
"If you insist," she sighed, stepping back and reaching for another napkin to replace the used one he held in his hand. "Are we done here?" she asked, gently pressing the fresh paper against his nose.
"That's up to you." He blotted his blood from her shoulder. "Do you feel better now?"
She nodded, pulling the napkin away from his face and noting with relief that the bleeding had already almost stopped.
"Then I think we're done," Angel said.
"Oh I don't think so, mate." Spike glared at his sire, Angel now the sudden recipient of attention that rightfully belonged to Spike. "Just what the hell is going on here?"
Angel smiled at him, a cold smile that brought an even deeper chill to Spike's bones than his own blood.
"Just correcting a little misunderstanding you helped to perpetuate." Angel's tone sounded pleasant and mild...at least to anyone who hadn't seen him decimate a small town with every bit as much good humor. "Now that we have, I think we'll be going."
Angel turned and took Buffy's arm. "After you," he said, gesturing towards the door. She looked curiously at him, but willingly started to walk beside him towards the exit. After a few steps, however, Angel stopped and snapped his fingers.
"Almost forgot something," he explained as he released Buffy's arm. A lightning quick turn and two long strides took him right back to Spike, who went flying into a nearby table an instant after Angel's fist shot out and caught the younger vampire hard on the jaw. Angel regarded the limp form on the floor with grim satisfaction.
"Now I feel better too."
* * * * *
They took the long way home, walking slowly as they caught up on the little day-to-day inconsequentials that they had missed in each other's lives the past three years. As much as Angel wanted to get back and check on Connor, he was almost sorry when they finally reached Buffy's front porch; the walk had been a restful interlude that seemed to exist out of time, free of the cares and woes they normally carried with them.
"I guess this is where we stop," he said regretfully as they climbed the porch steps.
"We're home, if that's what you mean," she answered lightly, trying to read the expression on his pale face in the flickering of the faulty porch light.
Angel squeezed Buffy's hand tightly and tried not to picture his empty room back at the Hyperion. Until a few hours ago, he had called that home, but now he was unsure.
"I wonder if Dawn got Connor to sleep," he mused, glancing at the front door that separated Buffy's world from his. "If she did, I almost hate to wake him, but..."
"Then don't," Buffy said quickly. She lifted the hand that was intertwined with Angel's and pressed it to her heart. "I don't want you to leave, Angel; at least not yet. Stay a few days and we can really talk...about the future, not just the past this time."
Angel raised his free hand to brush her cheek. "I want to," he admitted, the huskiness in his voice betraying how much he truly did. "I want you to get to know Connor, and I want to get to know you again."
"I want that too; both parts."
His hand fell to his side, but the look in Angel's eyes offered almost as palpable of a caress as his cool fingertips. His next words might have worried her, if not for that melting gaze.
"But I don't want to rush things this time," he warned. "There are too many other people and things to consider now...Connor, Dawn, your friends, my friends, your calling, my business. We have to be careful, not like...before."
She nodded. "I know. Strange as it sounds, I think we actually had it easier when our biggest problem was the trapdoor on your curse."
"Which might still be there; we can't be sure yet. When I thought it was the Powers I felt a little more secure, but knowing it was Dawn..." He shrugged and smiled apologetically. "I think we'd better take a look at that protection spell and make sure it doesn't come with an expiration date before we test it out."
Buffy drew a deep breath; she'd been thinking the same thing, but that didn't mean she still wasn't a little disappointed.
"Agreed. But in the meantime..."
"In the meantime, we can...catch up, before we...catch up." Angel's smile was tender as he leaned down to capture her lips in a kiss that left them both weak in the knees.
"Whoa," Buffy whispered several minutes later, as she leaned against Angel's chest and tried to catch her breath. "We better take our time quickly, if you know what I mean."
"Maybe we should go in," Angel murmured, burying his face in the living gold of her hair. "Too much temptation when I have you all to myself...under the stars...in the moonlight..."
She stepped back hastily and grabbed for the doorknob. "Okay, we have to focus," Buffy said breathlessly. "Baby. Teenager."
Angel winced as another thought occurred to him. "Phone call to make," he added to the list with a groan.
Buffy cocked her head to the side, momentarily diverted from passion by curiosity. "Phone call?"
"I, uh, need to call LA and let them know we won't be back for a few days." Angel paused, debating the wisdom of sharing his real motivation. In the end, he decided only honesty would suffice. "And I have to tell Cordelia she was right."
Buffy drew her breath sharply between her teeth, producing a hissing noise. "Yikes. Didn't I make you do enough time in hell already?"
"Buffy, I can't leave things the way they were. She might think...well, I'd rather admit I was an idiot than have her confused about where we stand." He cocked an eyebrow at his beloved. "You don't want her to get the wrong idea, do you?"
Buffy turned the doorknob so quickly that it snapped off in her hand. She didn't even seem to notice it dangling between her fingers as she pointed into the hallway with her other hand.
"There's the phone; start dialing."
* * * * *
To Be Continued
Part 3
By Gem
Buffy blinked a few times as her jaw worked up and down, trying to wrap both mind and lips around the unexpected name.
"Cordelia?" she finally choked out. "Cordelia Chase?"
"The one and only," Angel said lightly, and hated himself a moment later for his flippancy.
"But that's not pos..." she sputtered. "It just doesn't make sen...Cordy?"
Her tone begged for a denial, but Angel could only offer reluctant confirmation.
"Yes, Cordy."
"Oh this is just way too weird even by my standards...and this is Return From the Dead Girl talking." She blew a hissing sigh between her teeth. "I mean, sure, Darla pulls her dust together and gets pregnant after she becomes a vampire for the second time; that I can buy. But you and Cordy?" Her voice rose to an indignant squeak.
"Buffy, she's not the same person you remember," he said defensively. "She's been a really good friend to me the past few years, especially since Connor was born."
"How good?" she snapped.
"Not...like that," he answered uncomfortably. In at least one instance, he knew it hadn't been for lack of trying. "But she's known me long enough to know when she can push, and when to back off, and some of my...quirkier...habits don't faze her. That takes a lot of the stress off of me trying to fit in." He shrugged helplessly. "She's...I don't know...familiar. Safe."
"Safe?" she repeated incredulously. "The girl who called herself the slayer of the dating world?"
"And how long ago was that, Buffy?" He cocked an eyebrow at her, as though he really expected an answer. "You've barely talked to her in the last three years. People grow up. They change."
She drew one shaky breath, and then another, trying to hold back the unexpected wave of jealousy surging through her veins. All right, she admitted, it wasn't totally unexpected, not the jealousy part anyway. She had always been a little possessive when it came to Angel. But it had been a long time since she'd thought Cordelia posed any threat.
"Maybe I shouldn't have even brought it up," he continued, "but...I wanted to be honest with you."
"Yeah, well, gotta love that honesty thing. It's always worked out so well for us in the past," she reminded him with a grimace.
Angel stubbornly shook his head. "It's the only way we'll get a future," he insisted.
A future; he wanted a future. With her. Not with Cordelia, but with her. Buffy hung on to that idea with all her slayer strength, holding it as counterweight against almost every other damning word coming from her beloved's mouth.
"You said she didn't believe you," she prompted, now looking for some positive aspect of the situation, if such a thing actually existed. "Did she...she didn't laugh, did she? Because I might have to hurt her if she...wait, why am I defending you?" She waited a beat. "And...do I need to defend you?"
He shook his head again, still sporting that mystified little half-smirk that was starting to annoy her. He seemed to actually find something amusing in this whole disaster, though for the life of her Buffy couldn't see what that might be.
"She didn't laugh, but she did think I was joking at first," he admitted. "Then she thought I was crazy. But when I told her about...about the last time I saw you...she knew."
Buffy's eyes narrowed as she pulled her hands free of Angel's clasp. "How much did you tell her?"
"Not details," he hastily assured her. "Mostly it was just how I felt...when you didn't believe my soul was secure."
"You know why I didn't!" she protested. Suddenly she couldn't sit still one minute longer; she stood up and began to rapidly pace back and forth in front of the stone bench. "It had nothing to do with you; it was me."
"And I know that now, but not then. You wouldn't talk to me," he reminded her. "I spent the whole drive down to meet you planning our future, because curse or no curse I wasn't going to let you go ever again; I couldn't."
He reached out a hand and caught her arm as she strode past, swinging her around to face him.
"But you never gave me a chance to say half the things I wanted to say," Angel continued, "and then when I tried to tell you the curse obviously wasn't an issue, you didn't believe me. I understand now, but at the time it..." he looked blindly at the moonlit graveyard, seeing only visions of the past, "it felt like you didn't want it to be real...that once we really could be together, you didn't want to be."
"Like I didn't?" she flared, yanking her arm free. "Who left who?"
"That was a long time ago, and I still think I did the right thing. We both needed time to find more strength within ourselves before we could be any good to each other."
"And this all somehow led you to a mad passion for Cordelia?" She smacked her hand to her head and choked out a harsh laugh. "And I thought it was bad enough that I slept with Spike. At least I never pretended I loved him."
"I never made love to Cordelia," he said steadily, forcing down any comments about the debatable virtue of sex without love. "I never even tried to...at least not as me. There was this one time with the ghosts of two...never mind; it's not important."
"Maybe I should be the judge of that." Buffy tossed her head, but the effect was just not the same with her shorter hair, leaving her no physical way to express her distaste but to stalk back and forth like an agitated lioness.
"I'm sorry if you're angry with me, but I haven't done anything I'm ashamed of." Angel paused, and then reconsidered his statement. "Except maybe for trying to use a friend as an easy way out of being lonely. You tell yourself that you're reaching out to someone, and that's a good thing. A healthy thing."
His dark eyes followed every restless movement of Buffy's body as he puzzled out his motivations for both of their sakes. He needed to understand all this almost as badly as she did.
"Trouble is, what you're really doing is hiding behind them so the rest of the world will stop...expecting...things from you once they can't single you out from the crowd."
Buffy abruptly flung herself back down onto the bench, her burgeoning anger deflated by his last words. This was all so confusing and...wrong. All she had wanted was to share her life with Angel, and instead they had ended up living almost the same life in two different cities.
"Well I wouldn't call Spike a friend by any stretch of the dictionary," she grudgingly allowed, "but I suppose I can't say I did much better." She laughed sharply. "And we won't even touch on the Riley subject."
"Buffy, no. I mean, yes...but no." Angel was forced to stop and regroup, watching her with deep concern as he searched for the right words to express himself. "I mean yes...probably...with Riley. But Spike? That's not even close. You didn't use Spike; if anything, he used you."
"You weren't there; you didn't see."
"But I know you," he insisted. "Look, I know you weren't raised as a Catholic, but do you know why the Church considers suicide a mortal sin?"
She shook her head, her brow furrowing as she tried to see the parallel he was drawing.
"A suicide is supposed to be prompted by despair," he explained. "Despair, in Church terms, is when you abandon all hope of salvation and turn your back on everything you believe in, on God himself."
"Herself," she automatically corrected.
He waved away the technicalities. "When Willow brought you back, and you had to face the loss of heaven, and your mother, and all the dreams of the future that you'd hung onto for so long...you despaired. And Spike saw that, and he took advantage of it for his own reasons."
Angel didn't bother to delve into Spike's reasons; he'd known his wayward childe long enough to guess at most of them, and none of them stacked up against the damage he'd done to Buffy.
"Angel, it wasn't easy for me to face what I was doing with Spike, but I did it." Buffy took a deep breath, reminding herself that it was, at least and at last, all in the past. "Our...whatever you want to call it...was ugly and stupid and self-destructive, and I admit a part of me knew that all along; I just...didn't care enough about myself to stop, I guess. But you're taking something away from what I've learned if you make it out like it was all his fault." She leaned forward and looked intently into his eyes. "I messed up. Me. Not only me...but me."
He didn't want to believe that; he wanted so badly for it to be all some manipulation of Spike's. He knew the larger part of it was, but he wanted the vampire to be completely to blame. If he wasn't the only one at fault, then Angel had to admit that at least a little of the light and innocence he had hoped to preserve for his beloved by leaving, she had sacrificed of her own free will.
"It's just hard for me to admit that..."
"That I'm not perfect?" she broke in. "I know; quite the shocker, isn't it?" She shrugged and smiled at the sad truth. "Look, it doesn't matter anyway whose fault the Spike disaster was. What matters to me right now is that you," she could barely make herself say it, "fell in love with Cordelia."
"I never said that; I said I managed to convince myself I did." He risked reaching out to take her hand in his; to his relief she let him. "And without even knowing it, you made me realize I'd been an idiot."
"I never said that," she quickly pointed out in turn.
"You didn't have to." He felt something loosen in his chest; suddenly he felt freer for the honesty that now lay between them, painful though it had been, and still was. "It was written all over your face, and even the dark can't hide your face from me."
"And does my face also tell you where we're supposed to go from here?" she asked ruefully. "Or should we go raid the Magic Box for tea leaves?"
"Where do you want to go from here?" he asked carefully, hoping he already knew the answer.
She was silent for a moment, trying to marshal the courage to ask a very important question one last time. Perhaps now, after so much dirty laundry had been aired, she would get the complete response.
"Why did you really come tonight, Angel?"
"I asked you first," he said quickly.
"Angel, please, just tell me," she begged. "No sweet nothings necessary this time; no ego boosts or lollipops for the emotionally damaged, just a straight answer. Why?"
He didn't want to do this now. The worst had been said, and apparently forgiven; couldn't the fine points wait for a later time?
"I told you; I wanted to set things straight between us."
"Because you wanted to clean up the past before you started over with Cordy," Buffy wearily corrected him. "That was the real reason, wasn't it?"
Reluctantly, he surrendered to the inevitable.
"I thought so when I started out," he answered quietly. "I've gotten pretty good at fooling myself, or maybe I was just always gifted that way. But when I look at you...everything else just falls away." He couldn't help his gentle chuckle. "I know everyone always thinks I can't see straight when it comes to you, but the truth is that being with you, or even the thought of being with you, makes everything crystal clear."
"That makes one of us," she sighed.
"Why do you think I try to stay away from you, Buffy?" He traced the line of her jaw with one cool fingertip. "It's not because you cloud my thoughts; it's because I can see everything so well, and sometimes that scares the hell out of me."
To any other woman it might not have sounded romantic, but to Buffy it was poetry. Still, experience had taught her to look for the cloud wrapped around the silver lining.
"And what happens when you go back to LA? Because you will go back; you have to. We both know that."
"That's what I want to know too. I was ready to commit myself to you months ago, when I first found out you were alive again. And as much as I've tried to pretend I got over that idea, I never really gave it up. Not in here." He lightly thumped his fist against his chest. "Do you remember what I said to you the night of your birthday?"
She nodded; there was no need to ask which birthday.
"I love you," he confessed, as he had that rainy night so many years ago. "I try not to...but I can't stop."
She should have been thinking of Cordelia, of Connor, of Dawn, of her duties and his, but in this moment all she could think of was that night, and this man. Everything had seemed possible for them then, and for some crazy reason he still believed it could be possible now. No matter what, or who, had passed between them in the meantime, she could still give no other answer than the one she had offered the night of her 17th birthday.
"I can't either," she whispered, leaning over to kiss him.
She'd had a lot more experience in kissing since the last time they were together; she'd had a lot more experience in a lot of things she wasn't too anxious to tell him about. But the way Buffy felt when Angel's arms were wound around her, and his chest pressed hard against her own, and his lips softly moved against hers...none of that had anything to do with any man she'd ever known but him.
With Spike, even with Riley, it had all been about the physical sensation. She'd tried so hard to sublimate the pain in her heart with other pleasurable sensations. But with Angel there was no question of diversion, only of a slow and merciful healing.
* * * * *
Angel broke the kiss at last, when he dimly perceived that Buffy's labored breaths had become less a matter of passion and more a matter of oxygen- deprivation. He couldn't bear to release her so soon, however, and even as she buried her head in his shoulder he continued to worship the tender skin at the juncture of her neck and shoulder.
"You're cold," he murmured against her throat. "We should go back."
"Not yet," she protested, wrapping her arms tighter around his chest. "Back is...bad. Responsibilities...sacred duties...nosy sisters. Bad."
He chuckled, blowing a puff of cool air against her suddenly overheated skin as he nuzzled behind her ear. "I have to check on Connor sometime," he reminded her. "And you have no coat."
She sighed and pulled back slightly in his embrace, just far enough to allow her to look at him. A shaft of moonlight broke through the passing clouds and silvered the dark spikes of his hair. Below, his face glowed dimly, every feature already etched on her heart beyond the need for eyes to verify.
"You're supposed to give me yours," she pointed out, smiling at the memory.
"Sorry; took off too fast to grab it."
The unintentional reminder of her flight into the night succeeded in dampening Buffy's romantic ardor where the chill evening air had failed. After she carefully slid her legs off of Angel's, she cupped his pale face in her hands. She needed to look into his eyes as she made her apology; she needed to know that he absorbed every word so he would know her escape had nothing to do with him.
"I shouldn't have run out like that; I'm the one who's sorry. I was handling the idea of Connor, and I think I could have taken the Spike talk, but when you explained about the magick being permanent...and changing me...I, umm, freaked."
"I really thought Giles would have explained by now." He could kick himself for not making sure of his facts beforehand; he would never forget the devastation in her eyes when she learned the change was permanent.
"He probably figured I wouldn't take it too well," she suggested, laughing sharply. "Can't imagine where he'd get that idea."
"Buffy, it really doesn't make you anything less. You're more now, something extra. And you can use that something extra to help you stay alive." He clasped his hands over hers against his cheeks. "We need you to do that."
She didn't ask him to explain who 'we' was; there was only one true 'we' in Angel's life right now, and hopefully the other half of it was sound asleep by now in the arms of Auntie Dawn. It gave Buffy a warm glow that Angel fit her so effortlessly into the picture, though it still didn't change her problem.
"I'm not planning on going anywhere soon, Angel, but I wish I knew more about the me that I'm turning into while I'm here." Her hands fell away from his face, balling up into fists as they descended to her lap. "I mean I've seen what magick can do to you, the damage it can cause if you let it too deep under your skin. And yet you're telling me it's already under mine whether I like it or not, and it's only going to get worse. That scares me."
"It's not the physical part that's worrying you, is it?" he guessed shrewdly. "You still think there's something wrong with your soul, even though the magick is really only affecting your body."
"You say it's just my body," she said, "but how can you be sure? You said this magick gave me prophetic dreams; what, are they supposed to come from eating a certain type of cheese doodle or something? There has to be something in my soul too. And it's getting bigger."
She bit her lip and reached up to twist a lock of her hair around her fingers as Angel struggled to find the wisdom he needed to help her cope. He wanted to offer a hug and a kiss to make everything all better, but the only one that truly worked on was Connor. She needed more than love, and she needed more than words.
"Come on," he said, getting to his feet. He held his hand down in front of her bemused face. "Come on," Angel repeated with a hint of his old cryptic smile. "I'm not getting any older, but you're not getting any younger. Let's go."
She sighed; obviously romance was already taking a back seat to child-care.
"You're right." She reluctantly stood up. "Connor needs his daddy and Dawn probably needs a teenager's version of Valium right now - a pint of Cherry Garcia and a spoon."
"Actually I had something a little less domestic in mind." He checked his watch. "You gave Spike the boot about an hour ago, so I estimate Willie is already serving him his third shot of Bushmill's and blood right about now." Angel noticed her involuntary shudder. "Oh, sorry; I guess I'm kind of used to talking about the blood thing now. I didn't think..."
"No, it's not that," she said quickly, resting her hand on his arm as she gazed earnestly up into his eyes. "It's the whiskey...I really have bad memories...that is I really have really fuzzy bad memories...of whiskey and Spike and, umm, gambling for kittens. Not me gambling," she added hastily. "I was, well, I was a little too busy with the whiskey...hence the peach fuzz on those memories."
"He was gambling for...never mind." He shook his head sharply as he slipped his hand around hers. "We're going to find him, and prop him up if necessary, and let him take a swing at me. Then we can go home and..."
"Wait, no," she interrupted. "Angel, why? Why let him take a swing at you? Shouldn't you be doing the swinging?" She was grateful for the dim light of the cloud-covered moon as she felt a flush steal over her cheeks. Even so, she glanced away as she asked, "Not that I want to be fought over or anything, but isn't that...isn't that how it's done?"
Angel kept one hand firmly wrapped around hers, and with the other he gently turned her face towards him. "I have no need to fight over you; you're a big girl and you make your own choices. But I do need to prove to you that Spike can hit a not-entirely human body with a very human soul inside, and not feel anything but glee."
* * * * *
She stared at him and blinked her eyes for a few times, but he still didn't go 'poof' or turn into a giant electrical bill. He was real, not a dream, and thus what she just heard was also real.
"You're going to let Spike take a swing at you to prove there's nothing wrong with me?" she asked slowly. "Angel, that's...that's sweet, it really is. But, umm, how exactly will that prove anything about me? I mean, you and I are alike in a lot of ways, but physically," she glanced down at her body skeptically, "we're kind of not at all."
"And trust me, I'm not complaining." His teasing tone only lasted a moment, however. "Look, my body was human too, once upon a time. I admit it was upon a long time, but in some ways my body is still human; it just functions a little differently because of the demon inside me."
"As in, that's why it still functions," she said gently.
"Because I have something extra in me," he agreed. "But my soul is human; nothing very special."
"Now there we definitely disagree."
He couldn't resist pressing a quick kiss to her forehead for that comment. Actually he would have preferred aiming a little lower on her face, but he didn't want to get distracted from his purpose.
"If Spike can hit me, with my human-plus body and human soul, and he doesn't feel any pain, won't that convince you that the only reason he can hit you now is because the magick used to resurrect you changed your body somehow?"
She considered the question from all angles, coming to a grinding halt at one particular outcome. "And what if he does feel pain?"
Angel smiled crookedly at her. "Then your soul is even more special than I remembered."
"What am I going to do with you?" she asked, pretending his answer exasperated her rather than making her knees shake. "No matter what I say, you're going to stand there and let Spike take a poke at you and not even defend yourself just to..."
"I didn't say I wouldn't defend myself." Angel's tender smile turned a little colder as he interrupted her. His anger was under control, but only time would smooth the sharp edges that cut into his soul. "I'll let him get his punch in, but I can't very well let him get away without getting mine in as well."
"Angel."
He shrugged and feigned innocence. "It wouldn't be safe for him to get the reputation of being able to take me down. My name still carries a certain...cachet...among the demon community. If it got out that Spike beat me, he'd be facing more trouble than he can handle." A wicked grin lit his eyes. "It wouldn't be fair to him."
"You're all heart," she drawled, but her own eyes shone like twin sparklers a minute later as an opportunity occurred to her. "Ooo, if you get to punch Spike, does that mean I can take a swing at Cordy? I'll even let her go first."
Angel's gloating expression fast became a frown as he gazed sternly down at his beloved. "No, we're going to leave Cordelia out of this. She didn't do anything to come on to me, Buffy; I made up the whole relationship myself based on the time we spent together."
"If that's supposed to make me not want to punch her," Buffy shook her head, "then you still have a lot to learn about women."
He cocked his head to the side; trying to think of the best way to explain a madness he was still grappling to understand himself.
"For a hundred years, the only human emotions I knew were guilt and shame. But after spending the last six years loving you, I feel so much I can't always keep all the emotions straight. I got confused." Angel paused for an instant to emphasize his coda. "She didn't."
"Oh, all right," she grumbled, "I guess I can live without punching her lights out...even if now I'm kind of mad she thought there was something wrong with having you like her. I mean there was," she added hastily, not wanting to give him any ideas. "But that's for me to say, not Cordelia."
"Can we just go find Spike?" Angel pleaded. "It's way past Connor's bedtime, and I'm not sure if he'll go down without his usual routine."
"I suppose," she sighed, slipping her arm through his. "But you know a bar fight really loses something when it has to be finished up before night- nights."
* * * * *
Spike pushed the empty shot glass across the bar, already impatient for Willie to finish serving the two Charleth demons at the far end. He'd asked for the bottle, both bottles actually, but Willie didn't trust demons not to use the libations as weapons, and the little human hated cleaning blood up off the floor. So here he sat, William the Bloody, waiting for a human to give a damn that he was thirsty. Waiting for a human to give a damn that he was all alone. Waiting for a certain human to realize she'd made the biggest mistake of what was going to be a bloody short life and come crawling back to him, begging for his forgiveness. Not that he'd give it, of course; she didn't deserve it. But how he wanted to hear that begging.
"Willie!" he barked, suddenly reduced to a bit of begging himself. "Can't you see when a man's thirsty, damn you?"
"And just what would that have to do with you?" asked a voice from a few feet behind him.
Spike closed his eyes and shook his head. Simply marvelous. As though the night hadn't been bad enough already, now Angelus was crowding him out of his chosen refuge. No, wait; he'd already done that earlier tonight. Now he was going for Spike's last refuge.
"What's the matter, Spike? Chip got your tongue?"
Spike spun around on the bar stool, realizing an instant too late that he should have opened his eyes first. The world continued on a sickening slide even after his feet slammed down to stop the rotation, and he had all he could do to keep his liquid solace from making a return trip up his esophagus.
"Angel! Slayer!" Willie called out anxiously, scurrying back to Spike's end of the bar. "Hey, long time no see, my friend. How's the big city treating you? Bet you haven't found any establishments as fine as this one...though if you have I'm sure you treat them and their patrons...and their owners...with the utmost respect and..."
"Relax, Willie," Angel drawled. "We're not here to make trouble; we just want to settle a little...dispute."
"You know, they have these things called courthouses," Willie said quickly. "What you do is you get yourself a lawyer and you...did you just growl? Because I don't think I've ever heard you growl before and..."
"Do not mention lawyers," Angel snapped, his calm momentarily deserting him.
Buffy laid her hand on his arm, squeezing it in silent warning. "It's kind of a sore subject," she told Willie.
Angel took a deep breath and focused his attention once again on the issue at hand: Spike.
"I'm just here to ask my friend Spike a favor." Angel tried to keep his tone light and unthreatening, but he couldn't help the bitterness that welled up into the last few words.
"Sure, mate; what ya' need?" Spike could feel his head beginning to clear already, from the combined forces of anger and his vampiric constitution. Still, it wouldn't hurt to play the drunken sot a bit longer to keep his sire off guard. "You've already taken my girl; need to borrow my crypt too? She kind of likes the cold stone against her..."
His final words were cut off by a hand on his throat, but it was not Angel's fingers that flattened his windpipe and drove Spike to his knees. Buffy leaned in very close, her breath flowing sweetly over his face as she whispered in the ear that wasn't being jammed against the edge of the bar.
"If you stop with the gutter mouth this minute, you might not end up clogging one up the next time it rains." She stepped back, releasing his throat, though he could see she was poised to strike again if she believed it warranted. "Now we need you to settle a little argument for us. Do it, and we can all walk out of here tonight."
Spike rubbed his throat ostentatiously as he got to his feet. "What kind of favor are we talking about?"
"Punch me."
It was not the reply Spike had been expecting from Angel.
"You want me to do what?" Spike pounded his fist against his ear. "Must be going deaf in my old age. I thought you were inviting me to have a whack at you."
Angel crossed his arms over his chest, fixing his errant progeny in his cold gaze. "I am. One punch." He held up his index finger. "One."
Spike nodded sagely, now onto their game. "Sure, and then Little Miss Death Warmed Over will pop out a stake and I'll be soot on the peanut shells before I can pull my fist back."
Buffy raised her hands in the air, showing Spike her empty palms. "No stakes; I promise." The hands came down as she clarified her position. "This is, however, a one-time deal. As soon as we walk out of this bar tonight, we're back to the old rules: you touch him and you die. Painfully."
"Come on, Spike. Time's a wasting." Angel tapped his foot impatiently. "Buffy's promised not to stake you, and I won't even hit back. You get one good punch, no strings attached. What do you have to lose?"
"You won't hit back? Am I supposed to believe that?"
"Up to you." Angel shrugged; he preferred to remain noncommittal on this point, but he had no qualms about lying if that was what it would take to ensure Spike's cooperation. "But you heard Buffy; it's a one-time offer. Take the chance now or lose it forever."
Spike didn't believe a word of it. There was a trick hidden somewhere in the offer; he was sure of it. But by now the whole bar was watching the floorshow, waiting to see him back down. Either way he was screwed, and these were the demons he had to face every day, unlike the ringer from out of town. Keeping that thought firmly in mind, he slowly stood up and aimed his fist at Angel's nose. Even though the injury wouldn't last long, he wanted to make sure it was a disgusting one.
The punch was swift, and harder than Angel had expected, given Spike's inebriated condition. The older vampire rocked back on his heels from the force of the blow as the pain shot through his nerve endings and screamed all the way up to his brain.
Buffy only had eyes for Spike.
"Did that hurt?" she asked anxiously, all but x-raying his face with her burning eyes.
Spike couldn't help but smile, despite the pain in his hand. "Thought you didn't care?" he murmured, chafing his reddened fingers with his other palm. Fingers reddened with Angel's blood, but Buffy still didn't seem to be concerned about that factor.
"Your head, idiot," she snapped. "Did that hurt your head?"
Spike reached up to touch his skull, momentarily puzzled by her question, and by the growing coldness in her voice. "I hit him with my fist, luv, not with my head. That won't hurt till the whiskey wears off."
Buffy slowly turned to face Angel, a small smile teasing at the corners of her mouth. "Guess you're pretty proud of yourself."
Angel slid his long arm past her to grab a cocktail napkin from the end of the bar. "I'm not sure 'pride' is the word for it," he admitted ruefully as he gingerly pressed the napkin to his nose.
Spike was completely baffled when Buffy threw her arms around Angel's neck, heedless of the blood dripping out of his nose once she'd pushed his arm, and the napkin, aside. Angel's arms automatically came up again, but to hold her fast, not push her away.
"Thank you," she whispered into her lover's neck. "You didn't have to...but thank you."
"I'd say this was worth a bloody nose," he murmured, brushing his cheek against the soft curtain of her hair before he reluctantly let her go. "But since I seem to be dripping that blood onto your shoulder, maybe we better save this for a little later."
"If you insist," she sighed, stepping back and reaching for another napkin to replace the used one he held in his hand. "Are we done here?" she asked, gently pressing the fresh paper against his nose.
"That's up to you." He blotted his blood from her shoulder. "Do you feel better now?"
She nodded, pulling the napkin away from his face and noting with relief that the bleeding had already almost stopped.
"Then I think we're done," Angel said.
"Oh I don't think so, mate." Spike glared at his sire, Angel now the sudden recipient of attention that rightfully belonged to Spike. "Just what the hell is going on here?"
Angel smiled at him, a cold smile that brought an even deeper chill to Spike's bones than his own blood.
"Just correcting a little misunderstanding you helped to perpetuate." Angel's tone sounded pleasant and mild...at least to anyone who hadn't seen him decimate a small town with every bit as much good humor. "Now that we have, I think we'll be going."
Angel turned and took Buffy's arm. "After you," he said, gesturing towards the door. She looked curiously at him, but willingly started to walk beside him towards the exit. After a few steps, however, Angel stopped and snapped his fingers.
"Almost forgot something," he explained as he released Buffy's arm. A lightning quick turn and two long strides took him right back to Spike, who went flying into a nearby table an instant after Angel's fist shot out and caught the younger vampire hard on the jaw. Angel regarded the limp form on the floor with grim satisfaction.
"Now I feel better too."
* * * * *
They took the long way home, walking slowly as they caught up on the little day-to-day inconsequentials that they had missed in each other's lives the past three years. As much as Angel wanted to get back and check on Connor, he was almost sorry when they finally reached Buffy's front porch; the walk had been a restful interlude that seemed to exist out of time, free of the cares and woes they normally carried with them.
"I guess this is where we stop," he said regretfully as they climbed the porch steps.
"We're home, if that's what you mean," she answered lightly, trying to read the expression on his pale face in the flickering of the faulty porch light.
Angel squeezed Buffy's hand tightly and tried not to picture his empty room back at the Hyperion. Until a few hours ago, he had called that home, but now he was unsure.
"I wonder if Dawn got Connor to sleep," he mused, glancing at the front door that separated Buffy's world from his. "If she did, I almost hate to wake him, but..."
"Then don't," Buffy said quickly. She lifted the hand that was intertwined with Angel's and pressed it to her heart. "I don't want you to leave, Angel; at least not yet. Stay a few days and we can really talk...about the future, not just the past this time."
Angel raised his free hand to brush her cheek. "I want to," he admitted, the huskiness in his voice betraying how much he truly did. "I want you to get to know Connor, and I want to get to know you again."
"I want that too; both parts."
His hand fell to his side, but the look in Angel's eyes offered almost as palpable of a caress as his cool fingertips. His next words might have worried her, if not for that melting gaze.
"But I don't want to rush things this time," he warned. "There are too many other people and things to consider now...Connor, Dawn, your friends, my friends, your calling, my business. We have to be careful, not like...before."
She nodded. "I know. Strange as it sounds, I think we actually had it easier when our biggest problem was the trapdoor on your curse."
"Which might still be there; we can't be sure yet. When I thought it was the Powers I felt a little more secure, but knowing it was Dawn..." He shrugged and smiled apologetically. "I think we'd better take a look at that protection spell and make sure it doesn't come with an expiration date before we test it out."
Buffy drew a deep breath; she'd been thinking the same thing, but that didn't mean she still wasn't a little disappointed.
"Agreed. But in the meantime..."
"In the meantime, we can...catch up, before we...catch up." Angel's smile was tender as he leaned down to capture her lips in a kiss that left them both weak in the knees.
"Whoa," Buffy whispered several minutes later, as she leaned against Angel's chest and tried to catch her breath. "We better take our time quickly, if you know what I mean."
"Maybe we should go in," Angel murmured, burying his face in the living gold of her hair. "Too much temptation when I have you all to myself...under the stars...in the moonlight..."
She stepped back hastily and grabbed for the doorknob. "Okay, we have to focus," Buffy said breathlessly. "Baby. Teenager."
Angel winced as another thought occurred to him. "Phone call to make," he added to the list with a groan.
Buffy cocked her head to the side, momentarily diverted from passion by curiosity. "Phone call?"
"I, uh, need to call LA and let them know we won't be back for a few days." Angel paused, debating the wisdom of sharing his real motivation. In the end, he decided only honesty would suffice. "And I have to tell Cordelia she was right."
Buffy drew her breath sharply between her teeth, producing a hissing noise. "Yikes. Didn't I make you do enough time in hell already?"
"Buffy, I can't leave things the way they were. She might think...well, I'd rather admit I was an idiot than have her confused about where we stand." He cocked an eyebrow at his beloved. "You don't want her to get the wrong idea, do you?"
Buffy turned the doorknob so quickly that it snapped off in her hand. She didn't even seem to notice it dangling between her fingers as she pointed into the hallway with her other hand.
"There's the phone; start dialing."
* * * * *
To Be Continued