"This all ends here and now," Spike thought as he briskly walked toward the alleyway. He had called her to meet him here tonight so he could finally get all his feelings straightened out. "Tonight I will change things. After I talk to her I will no longer be obsessing over the slayer. I will have moved on. I will be free of those terrible lovesick dreams." Spike continued to head toward the dark alley and he smiled with great anticipation.

Finally, he reached the long, narrow stretch between the two buildings and headed into it. Smoke puffed from the back door of one of the buildings, but Spike still managed to see her dark figure silhouetted against the murky atmosphere. As he neared her, he could see she was wearing a long gauzy black dress and hung loosely from her wrists and hips. Spike smiled lazily as he approached her and he reached out to touch one of her dark locks of hair.

"Spike, darling," she drooled, outlining his profile with a slender finger.

"Drusilla. I've been waiting."