CHAPTER TWO: CARS AND CHICKS
Angelus stood at the bars to the cage that Angel had locked himself in, Cordelia standing behind the red line so that Angelus couldn't reach her. Her eyes told nothing, and she knew of a way to get Angelus to speak.
"Lemme guess. You want to know about the Beast," Angelus said, his voice lilting and soft, an Irish accent tinging his voice. It was so different to Angel, slightly seductive, powerful.
"Everything you know," Cordelia replied.
"Oh. And in return, I get what? Wouldn't mind a car. I hear the new Mustang is nice," Angelus said.
"Something better."
"What's a better ride than a Mustang?" Angelus asked curiously.
Cordelia paused for a moment, caught in her indecision.
"Me."
Angelus stared at her, wondering whether or not she was serious. He looked in her eyes and saw that she was. He burst out laughing, unable to contain himself. Cordelia just looked at the vampire, feeling offended by his amusement.
"You? Oh please Cordelia," Angelus taunted. "I don't want you. Soulboy doesn't even really want you."
Cordelia narrowed her eyes, and tried to remember what Wesley had said about Angelus using Angel's knowledge against them. Of course, Angelus was also a lying conniving asshole, but Cordelia had to wonder if Angelus was telling the truth.
"So what do you want Angelus?" Cordelia asked.
Angelus' lips curled into a smile. His hand moved from the bars and stroked his stomach slowly. He looked up at Cordelia who was surprised to see something like joy in the vampire's eyes.
"She's here," Angelus said quietly. "She came."
"She? Fred?" Cordelia asked.
Angelus just grinned. He shook his head and walked away from Cordelia.
"You'll find out soon enough. Leave Cordelia."
Cordelia hesitated, but finally turned around and walked back up the stairs, remembering to turn the camera back on as she passed.
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"He's not gonna tell us anything," Cordelia complained.
Wesley sighed tiredly and rubbed his eyes.
"We knew he wasn't going to," Fred commented.
"At least he's stopped singing," Lorne commented, rubbing his tired head. He had been blocking his gift of reading people who sang, and it had given him the mother of all headaches.
Wesley paced the foyer of the Hyperion Hotel, wracking his brains for the answer. He didn't know how to get Angelus to be co-operative. There was no incentive for Angelus to tell them anything. Apart from depriving the vampire of meals, they could do nothing to get him to speak.
"Can't we just threaten to kill him," Connor suggested, very much liking the idea of the vampire being dead and gone.
"He knows we won't kill him," Wesley replied. "Angel is too important to us."
"Not to all of us," Connor mumbled. No one heard him, or if they did, he was ignored.
"So now what do we do?" Fred asked.
Wesley didn't answer and the room fell silent.
"Hey, it's too bad that Darla chick bit the dust. She probably coulda got him to talk," Gunn comented absently.
Wesley's head snapped up and he looked at his former friend as though Gunn had just given him all the answers.
"Of course!"
Gunn just looked confused. "What? She's dead Wesley, she's not gonna be too much help."
Wesley ignored the comment and grabbed his cell phone from his pocket.
"Who are you calling?" Fred asked quietly.
"Buffy Summers," he replied.
The door to the Hyperion Hotel opened, and a small blonde figure walked in. She had a sombre look on her face and her cell phone began to ring. She took it out of her pocket, checked the caller ID and looked towards Wesley.
"I'll assume I don't need to answer this, right?" she asked.
Wesley turned his phone off and replaced it in his pocket, walking towards the Slayer. He looked her over carefully, noticing her damaged appearance.
"How on earth did you know we needed your help?" Wesley asked.
Buffy's hand absently touched her heart, a pensive look on her face.
"I felt it," she replied. She looked questioningly at her former watcher. "Is he Angelus, or is he dead?"
"The first I'm afraid," Wesley replied.
"Well, that's better than dead," Buffy said, a sigh of relief coming from her lips. She unshouldered her bag and placed it at her feet. She walked further into the foyer of the Hyperion Hotel, stopping at the counter where Gunn, Fred, Connor, Lorne and Cordelia were all gathered.
Cordelia gave Buffy a complete look of disgust, which Buffy valiantly ignored.
"Fred right?" Buffy asked, holding her hand out to the skinny brunette woman.
Fred nodded and the two girls shook hands. "It's good to finally meet you Buffy," Fred said kindly. She'd always wanted to meet the girl that Angel had mourned over. She'd never even seen a picture of Buffy, and even with the bruises on her face, Fred knew that Buffy was beautiful.
Gunn stepped forward and shook Buffy's hand. "I'm Gunn," he said.
"I've heard a lot of good things about you Gunn," Buffy said. "Of course Angel never said you were gorgeous."
Gunn flushed and took his hand back. Buffy looked at Fred and winked.
"You've got a keeper with this one," Buffy said. "Make sure you hold onto him."
Fred nodded and tried to work out how Buffy knew about her relationship with Gunn. As far as she, or anyone else in the Hyperion knew, Angel hadn't spoken to Buffy since just after she'd been brought back from the dead.
Connor stepped forward, curious about who this woman was, especially because of the bruising covering her body. She saw his movement and a brilliant smile lit her face.
"Connor," she said quietly.
Connor frowned and tilted his head to the side, wondering how she knew who he was, and why she was smiling at him.
"I've been wanting to meet you for a while," she admitted. "It's good to finally see you."
"I didn't know you knew about Connor," Wesley commented.
Buffy looked at him, a grin on her face. "Please Wes. The child of two vamps? I knew about Connor the day after he was born." She looked back at the young man in question and saw that he was not happy about the topic of his heritage. "Word is that you're quite the fighter. I wouldn't mind sparring against you when this is all over."
"Who are you?" Connor asked curiously. There was something about her, something that tugged in his heart. It wasn't attraction -even though he knew that she was beautiful- he had that towards Cordelia. It was something far more than that. Some bond, a connection that he couldn't explain.
"Oh, sorry," she said. She shook his hand. "Buffy Summers. Vampire Slayer and School Counsellor."
Cordelia snorted in laughter. "You're a counsellor?"
Buffy smirked at her and nodded.
"Wait…what's a Vampire Slayer?" Connor asked.
"Pretty much what it sounds like. I kill vamps and demons," Buffy explained.
"One girl in all the world chosen to protect humanity from the forces of darkness," Wesley intoned.
Cordelia rolled her eyes. She hated that she was jealous of Buffy Summers of all people. Angelus' words suddenly made sense to her. She's here…she came.
"There's not just one though anymore," Cordelia added. "Buffy got replaced."
Buffy refused to allow herself to rise to the bait. After weeks of dealing with a bunch of fifteen year olds and not losing her temper, she wasn't about to let one mean-spirited ex-Scooby member annoy her.
"So, where is he anyway?" Buffy asked, looking at Wesley. "By the looks of it, he's not rampaging around LA even though you've got that whole wacky no-sun thing happening."
"He's locked in a cage downstairs," Wesley explained.
Buffy looked a little shocked by this.
"You managed to capture Angelus?" she asked incredulously. "Wow. Major points to you guys. How'd he lose his soul anyway?"
Cordelia jumped in before anyone else could explain. "Surely you remember about the curse," Cordelia taunted. "Perfect happiness."
Buffy just grinned. "He finally worked out that peanut butter on chocolate was the perfect yum?"
Connor couldn't help but laugh. He was angry with Cordelia for many reasons, and even though he didn't understand who Buffy Summers was to Angel, he knew that Cordelia was trying to make her jealous. And, if Buffy was putting Cordelia down, he was alright with that.
Cordelia seethed, but couldn't say anything about she and Angel sleeping together, purely because it wasn't true.
Wesley cleared his throat and brought the attention back to the matter at hand.
"We uh…needed information from Angelus, so…we removed his soul."
Buffy stared at the Englishman for several seconds, shocked into silence. She couldn't even begin to understand what Wesley had just said. The sentence just didn't make sense at all.
"You removed Angel's soul?" Buffy asked slowly.
Wesley nodded.
"And you couldn't have chosen a better time to do it? I was in the middle of a fight, I felt it go. Nearly got me killed."
"Shame it didn't," Cordelia muttered.
Buffy heard her and glared at the girl.
"So, is Angelus talking or what?" Buffy asked.
Wesley shook his head sadly. "He won't tell us anything at all."
Buffy sighed. She'd thought that would be the answer, but she was still somewhat disappointed by it.
"Perhaps you could talk to him," Wesley suggested tentatively.
In truth, Buffy had been about to suggest the same thing, but she was grateful that it had come from someone else. She sighed heavily and nodded her agreement.
"Where?"
"Downstairs," Connor answered. "I can show you if you'd like."
Buffy smiled at the boy, unsure why he made her feel the way she did when she looked at him. She could sense him, like she could sense Angel, and there was something drawing her to him. Almost like the connection she'd always felt towards Dawn. It was nice. It stirred in her a protectiveness that she usually reserved for close friends and trusted loved ones. And here was an eighteen-year-old boy whom she'd known for five minutes stirring in her the same emotion.
"Thanks."
Connor nodded and the two of them moved towards the doors. Connor held it open for her, and she descended the stairs, comforted by the stake that was tucked into the back of her jeans.
Buffy walked down the stairs and saw Angel –Angelus- standing at the bars of the cage, staring intently at her. She couldn't help but smile. It had been too long since she'd seen Angel, and just the sight of him made her heart ache. He was still the most beautiful man she'd ever seen.
Angelus smiled and watched as his Slayer walked down the stairs.
"Hello lover."
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Hmmm, my very first B/A fic. Hope you guys enjoyed the beginning of it. It's (as always) a bit of a long fic. 17 chapters, 90 pages and still in progress…Anyways, please let me know what you thought. (And yes, I'm still working on What You Did and the sequel to a Murderer's Daughter, but this one's been calling out to me for weeks.)
Toodles.