A Pinch of What?

After, quite a while after the twins had been tucked into their beds, resembling nothing so much as the cherubs hanging from the overhead mobile, Spike pulled Rose into his arms, snuggling her close.

"You mind telling me what you were on about tonight, pet?" he asked, stroking her hair. He had a pretty good idea, Lorne had talked to him when he'd showed up for his reading. But he wanted to hear it from Rose herself.

"What are you talking about?" Rose murmured evasively.

"Remember how I was when you first got pregnant?" Spike decided to go with the diplomatic approach, point out that everyone, even him, made mistakes. "The way I wanted to do everything for you, and keep an eye on every little thing you did? 'Cause that's how you were being with the kids tonight, and I want to know why."

"Surely I wasn't that bad," she protested weakly. "Besides, I've never spent so much time away from them before, and I've missed them and..,"

"You're afraid that Oz is going to take your place," Spike finished, tired of dancing around the subject. "Sweetheart, that isn't going to happen. Those kids adore you. Almost as much as I do."

"Who told you?" Besides wanting to change the subject, Rose really wanted to know.

"How many people know?" Spike was shocked, and a little miffed. "Besides me, I mean. Me being the last person to know what's going on with the woman I share my entire life with."

"I was afraid you'd think I was being silly," Rose mumbled, still not answering the question. "I didn't want to disappoint you.., again."

Spike gave a sad little laugh. "That's part of the deal, luv," he remarked. "We'll disappoint each other from time to time, can't help it. But if you think I could be disappointed in you for loving our kids, well guess again." He gave her a squeeze. "The only part of the whole deal that I'm disappointed in is that you didn't talk to me about it first. Something that was that important to you, and you shut me out."

Rose lay there silently. She honestly couldn't think of anything to say. And now, to top it all off, she felt terribly..,

"And you're not to lay awake there feeling guilty half the night," Spike interrupted her train of thought. "People make mistakes. It's part of being human. Now, why don't you roll over and give me a kiss, babe?"

&&&&&&&

Nathan rolled off of Melody (another of the coven's members), sweating, panting, and feeling as if his heart was about to pound a hole in his chest. No matter what he'd like to think, he simply wasn't a young man anymore. But Melody was easily the most intelligent of the group, and this was the one way he'd found to distract her. Keep what brain she had from working properly. Okay, so she really wasn't all that bright, just in comparison to the rest.

Melody snuggled up to him. "You went away again," she accused. "You say that you're not using me, but you never seem to be all here with me."

"Of course I am," he lied automatically. Lying came to him almost as naturally as breathing. "I was thinking about you, my dear." And that, was not a lie. He just left out the part that what he was thinking about her was less than flattering.

"Were you really?" Her voice bubbled over. "Tell me what you were thinking."

"How beautiful you are and how lucky I am that you'll have an old man like me." Nathan laid it on thick, knowing that she'd lap it up.

"You're not old," she protested. "Besides, I like a more mature man. I'll bet you didn't look this good twenty years ago. A lot of men look better the older they get."

"And so you're bedding me for my good looks?" he teased. Still, he liked the thought that she found him attractive, damned nuisance though she was.

Even in the dark, he could feel her pout. "You know better than that, Nathan," she muttered sulkily. "I sleep with you because I think we were meant to be together. I think we're soul mates."

Nathan was about to remark that a soul was a highly overrated thing when he realized that such a remark would probably not go down well. "Time will tell," he murmured evasively.

"Why aren't you leading the coven?" she asked out of the clear blue. "Don't get me wrong, I think Jason is doing a good job. I just think that you could do it better."

"As you said, Jason is doing a good job," Nathan rejoined. He had deliberately kept in the background as much as possible and still be able to guide the fledgling coven to his own particular goal. "And I believe that you Yanks have a saying to the effect that if it isn't broken, don't repair it. It isn't broken, so I'm not looking to do any repairs."

"Fix it," she corrected him with a giggle. She loved the way he talked though. "The saying is, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'."

"I'll fix you," he said warningly. But what his hands were doing had very little to do with fixing someone, and a great deal to do with arousing them. Ah, the sacrifices that one had to make.

&&&&&&&&

Lorne made his way to Angel's office. He'd put away a bicarb on general principles before leaving his own office. He'd been putting it off, but there was no one left. The only light on the horizon was that if a demon would ever be allowed into heaven, he was a shoe in. He certainly did penance every time he had to listen to Angel sing.

"You're up, big guy," he announced in as cheery a voice as he could manage as he breezed into the office. "From every one else, I got pretty much the same as I did from the blossom. Which I'm afraid is narrowing it down considerably."

"Then why should I bother singing?" Angel didn't like to sing much more than anyone liked to hear him. "If no one else is the target, it must be me."

"Au contraire," Lorne disagreed. "It could be either one of us. And I can't do a reading on myself, more's the pity. Okay, so the safe money says it's probably you. But better safe than sorry." And if they could protect him, Angel would be safe, and he'd be sorry that he'd had to listen to him sing.., again.

Angel sighed and started what passed for singing with him. He didn't even think about it, hadn't consciously picked out a song. A good old Irish tune that had sprung into his head because he'd heard Alaric and Ariel singing it. And making a round out of the chorus. "The gypsy rover came over the hill, and down through the valley so shady. He whistled and he sang till the green woods rang. And he won the heart of a lady."

"That ties it down," Lorne interrupted. He'd heard the wee tikes sing it too. And much better than the boss. He didn't want the song ruined in his mind by Angel's vocal mangling. "It is you. Someone wants your blood. Literally."

"My blood?" Angel was feeling more than a little confused. "What would someone want my blood for? Or did you mean that in the sense that someone has a grudge against me and would like to dust me?"

"There seems to be a spell of some sort involved," Lorne muttered, brow furrowed in thought. "But it starts getting murky from there. That and something about the blue moon."

"You warned Oz about the blue moon," Angel remarked. "I can see where having two full moons in a month could be a problem for a werewolf. But why would a blue moon make any difference to me?"

Lorne shrugged. "I'm just telling you what I see," he replied. "And what I see says that there's something about a blue moon connected to all of this."

&&&&&&&&

Oz was back in the coffee shop with a newspaper again. But this time, instead of looking for a job, he was looking for a place to live. He liked his new situation better than he'd thought he would, and it might be nice to put down roots for a while, at least. He wasn't too serious about looking yet, though. He wanted to gather in a few more paychecks before he got serious about finding a place. But, it didn't hurt to look and see what was on the market. And all it cost was the price of a paper.

&&&&&&

"Darling," Rose said at dinner that evening. "Would you like to go pick a fight with Angel for me?"

Spike's eyes nearly popped out of his head. Usually, Rose was trying, however futilely, to get them to stop fighting. He would never in a million years have dreamed that she'd actually ask him to pick a fight with his grandsire. "I don't see a problem with that," he said cautiously, trying to hide his enthusiasm for the suggestion, but still wary as to what had prompted it. "Just on general principle, or do you have a specific reason?"

"The pictures we had taken came in to the studio," she explained. "So I asked if he'd have someone pick them up for me. Not only did he go and do it himself, but he paid for them. And he won't let me pay him back."

"I see." Spike had, once upon a time, had no problem with spending Angel's money. Now, it had become a matter of pride not to accept any financial help. Especially as they didn't really need it. But he had something else on his mind. "Where are they?"

"What?" Rose lost track of things for a moment. "Oh, the pictures. They're in the living room on top of the entertainment center."

Spike had to go look immediately. Despite all his fretting and fussing over the whole thing, he was now anxious to see how they'd come out. Besides, there ought to be some wallet sized snaps of the kids in the package. He was always ready to update the pictures in his wallet. He'd shown off the last ones to death.

Rose joined him.

"Shouldn't one of us be in there supervising the kids?" Spike suggested. Mealtimes were one way they had of not forgetting that the twins were still toddlers, even though they often spoke, and sometimes even acted like little adults. Sure to make a bloody awful mess if left to their own devices.

"I haven't even peeked once yet," Rose said. "Because I wanted to wait for you. So don't you dare look at them without me."

"How about a compromise?" Spike offered. "We'll go into the kitchen with them and we'll all look at them together."

They had turned out wonderfully well. As the photographer had said, they were a good looking group. There was even one where Alaric was still sulking over wearing a tie. But the photographer had taken solo portraits of all of them, and even paired them off in all possible combinations. And the one that caught Spike's eye wasn't one with the kids. It was him and Rose together, with their love for each other writ plain as print on their faces.

Rose nudged him out of his reverie. "Stop hogging them," she scolded. "Are you going to go argue with Angel about them like I asked?"

"Would tomorrow be soon enough, babe?" Spike asked. "I've been working all day. I'd really like to spend a little quality time with you and the kids. Tomorrow I can go bother the big pouf on company time."

&&&&&&&

"That isn't vervain," Nathan argued. "It's wolfsbane, and it doesn't belong in the spell." He'd forgotten he wasn't supposed to know these things. Though how anyone could not tell the difference was beyond him.

"The shop said it was vervain," Barry protested. "And I don't know one herb from the other. Since you're the expert, why don't you do it?"

"How did you know the difference, Nathan," asked Deb. "I thought you were as new to this as the rest of us."

"Unlike you, evidently," Nathan replied, quickly covering his mistake. "I've been doing some studying on the subject."

"I'm still having a little problem locating the black candles," David said. "You just don't see them everywhere. When people want candlelight, they usually want a more cheerful color than black."

"And I don't suppose that it occurred to you to check an occult supply shop?" Nathan felt relieved that Jason had stepped up to the plate for that one. He was quite losing patience with this lot.

"Well, duh," Jessica said with a giggle. She'd had the easy chore. Her contribution to the spell had been rosemary, which she grew in her own herb garden.

"We're never going to get anywhere bickering," Marcy commented. "There's still a week to go. We have time to get the proper components."

"But we have to make sure we get them right," Nathan felt obliged to point out. "The spell won't work if we don't have the proper components. Just like cooking. If you want the dish to come out right, you have to have the right ingredients."

"We'll have them," Jason said soothingly. "Get with the program, people. I thought everyone had gotten what they were supposed to, and that all we needed was the vampire's blood. Now I find out we're not even that prepared. Do you want this to work or not?"

There were shamefaced looks and muttered apologies.

"Are we going to meet again before the night of the spell casting?" Angela asked. "Just to make sure we have everything right?"

Jason nodded. "How's Wednesday with everyone?"

&&&&&&&&

The children had long since been tucked into bed. But Spike was still going through the pictures. He liked that one of his two girls, too. Ariel was just a miniature version of her mum. Whatever he thought his life, if he'd ever have one again, three years ago would be like, he'd never in his wildest dream imagined this. Or that he'd be so happy.