Spike had almost forgotten the raw, animalistic rapture that resulted from being with another vampire. His experience had really been limited. As William, a soft-hearted poet, he hadn't ever experienced carnal pleasure. Drusilla, his sire, had been his first lover. She was demanding, brutal and skilled. His tender heart had been abused mercilessly by his sire. She was like a cat who used his heart for prey, toying with it before finally ripping it apart. His need for gentleness was often ignored and always taunted. He had been faithful to her until he met Buffy.

Sex with a human was softer, warmer and sweeter. But it was also violent, thrashing and angry since the human he had chosen to be with was the Slayer. If he pushed aside the heartbeat and the coarsing of thick, hot blood through her veins, she wasn't much different from Dru. She felt no tenderness toward him. Her actions were a culmination of self-loathing and ravenous desire to feel not just anything, but intense pleasure wrapped in a thick veil of pain. She called him evil and soulless. Truth be told, she could have said the same things about herself. The Slayer had become the very monster she claimed to despise. She was a calculating killer. She just killed those she deemed as beneath her. How different was she from those she killed when she acted as sole judge, jury and assassin of the undead and less than human?

Bella pulled the covers up around them and snuggled into Spike's bare chest. She had taken him as her first lover and hadn't been nearly as prepared as she thought she would be when he took full possession of her body and soul over and over again. The roars of pleasure that had emanated from her had been enough to wake the dead and undead alike. His expert hands and tongue had brought her to the brink of insanity countless times before she toppled over the edge. When their bodies finally fused together for the first time, the white-hot pain of her barrier being torn brought her to yet another shattering climax as all coherent thought slipped away. For their kind, pleasure and pain always went hand in hand. It was Spike's tenderness that had taken her by surprise. His whispered words of love and endearment made her quake with desire as their bodies slid slowly against each other. The way he begged to be fully hers had made her cry out her acquiesence as another high shook through her.

She felt her fangs descend and looked into his eyes for guidance. He slipped into game face and held her tightly to him. He ran his tongue over the blue vein on the side of her neck where her sire had taken her. He wanted nothing more than to erase them from her for all of eternity, to take away the brutal tears Artemius had left scarred on her pale, slender throat.

He motioned for her to do the same, exposing his neck to her. She nuzzled against it with her nose and was assaulted by the scent of his sire's mark. She looked back up at him, her eyes silently asking him if he was sure.

"Absolutely, Kitten," he assured her.

He had no doubt in his mind that she was the one. As Drusilla would say, it was in the stars. He felt her fingers brush curiously over the mark before she sank her fangs deeply into them. His whole body thrummed at the welcome entrance of her sharp incisors. Bella felt him pulsing inside of her in completion as she pulled on his borrowed blood.

"Mine," she whispered, lapping at the blood as it trickled from the twin puncture marks on his alabaster skin.

"Yours," he vowed, gasping at the sensations she had produced.

He felt her run her tongue over the marks to help them close. He laced his fingers into her thick, dark hair and sank his own fangs into her delicate neck. Her blood was even more powerful than Slayer's blood. It was tinged with centuries of knowledge and death. She tasted of innocense and great wisdom all at once. Her blood was created by a sire who had walked the earth for thousands of years. It was the darkest, richest, most intoxicating elixir he had ever sipped.

He pulled deeply, purring his pleasure into her skin as he hardened inside of her again.

"Mine," he managed to groan, as he pulled his mouth away. He watched the dark sanguine liquor ooze from the marks he had just made. It mesmerized him as he ran the tip of his tongue up the side of her neck to catch every last drop of the precious fluid she had surrendered to him.

"Yours," she cried as another climax rippled through her body. "Always," she promised.

Bella awoke to the sound of pounding on her door. She had no idea how long the visitor had been trying to wake them, but Spike was still wrapped around her purring peacefully. She pried his arms from around her waist, trying not to wake him. He stirred but didn't open his eyes. He truly did sleep like the dead, she thought, as she grabbed her robe from the back of the bedroom door.

She padded quickly down the hall and glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already after sunset. She sniffed the air and smiled at Angel's scent. He'd made good on his word and made his way to the Home of the Hellmouth as soon as the sun went down.

Bella unlatched the deadbolt on the front door and grinned when she met Angel's agitated eyes. Apparently, he had been out there for awhile.

"I told you I'd be here at sunset," he grumbled, pushing his way in. "Are you just getting out of bed?"

Bella shut the door behind them and went to the kitchen to heat up some blood. She knew Spike would sense his grandsire's presence and snarl his way into the living room for a confrontation soon enough. She wondered how long it would take Angel to register Spike's scent.

Angel had made himself comfortable on the sofa while Bella rummaged through the kitchen. She dug out the bottle of peppered vodka and added a hefty amount to the saucepan of blood that was heating up on her stove. Spike seemed to think that it made the bottled animal blood a little more palatable. Bella had to stifle a giggle at the look on Angel's face as she poured the fiery liquid into the pan.

"So, uh..." Angel wasn't sure where to begin.

Bella poured the warmed blood into two mugs and then looked up at Angel.

"You hungry?" she asked.

He shook his head and watched as she continued dividing the thick liquid between the two mugs. He sniffed the air and cringed as his senses were flooded with his grandchilde's very unique signature. Spike was there. Angel knew that he should have expected it. He tensed up knowing that Spike would be rearing his lightning-blonde head at any moment and that sparks would fly as they always did when the two clansmen were in the same room.

Bella left a mug on the counter and carried hers to the coffee table where she joined Angel on the sofa. She crossed her arms and stared at him hard for a minute.

"What?" he finally sighed.

"Why do you hate him so much?" she found herself asking. "What did he ever do to you?"

What hadn't Spike done was the better question.

"I mean, seriously, Angelus," she frowned at him.

"It's Angel," he insisted firmly.

"Mmm-hmm. Angel," she repeated with just the right amount of bemusement to get under his already tingling skin. "What makes you so much better than him? I mean, in your mind. Because I really don't see much of a difference. Care to explain?"

Angel's spine tightened at Bella's words. She was a very direct creature. He was painfully aware of that. He was also sure that if he didn't give her the information she wanted freely, she'd take it from him. As Angelus, he had been a master at concealing his thoughts. But as Angel, the soul made it more difficult to keep a vampire as stealthy and as infused wth the blood of the ancients as she from invading his thoughts.

"He's evil," he replied a little too flippantly for Bella's taste.

"Really, now?" she asked, eyebrow arched indicating her doubt. "What makes him any more evil than Angelus?"

Angel hadn't come here for this. He had come to try and help the gang with the Hellmouth and the impending apocalypse. Bella was sidestepping. He knew that she wouldn't stop until she got the answers she wanted, though.

"Bella, it... we have a very... our past is...."

"Operative word, Soul Boy," she smirked. "Past."

Angel stared back at her. Her eyes were glittering and transluscent like seawater.

"We're all going to work together," she told him before leaning to retrieve her mug of blood from the table. She took a long sip from it, her eyes still focused on his. "Do you understand me?"

Angel nodded wearily. She was a very draining girl. Correction, creature.

"I've set the children straight. The Slayer and I have a very clear understanding. And the Watcher knows not to challenge me if he wants to see this apocalypse averted," she explained to him. "Now, I'm telling you... Liam."

His eyes widened at the use of his Christian name.

"I want to make damned sure that you, as man and beast, understand that I do not have to finish this unholy war. This was never my battle. You dragged me into it. And because I like this world and the presence of humans in it, I agreed to offer my assistance," she continued.

"Your assistance is predestined, Bella," he reminded her.

He felt a small bolt of electrical current run through his veins as Bella placed her hand on his.

"I am the mistress of my own destiny, you can be assured of that, Vampire," she seethed at him. "I stay because I choose to stay."

She heard the bedroom door creak open and saw Angel's gaze dart toward the direction of the sound. Spike stretched in the doorway before slowly making his way down the hall. Bella looked up at him with a sweet smile and nodded to the mug she'd left for him on the kitchen counter.

"I was hoping you'd join us before it got too cold," she smiled at her mate.

"Why didn't you wake me and let me know Peaches had arrived, Kitten?" he asked her lightly as he took the mug from the counter. He took a sip of the still-warm liquid. She'd spiked it with booze. Just the way he liked it.

"Trying to wake you is like trying to wake the dead, Darling," she joked. "Besides, Angelus and I needed to get a few things straight before pulling you into the fold."

Angel scowled again.

"Didn't we, Vampire?" she challenged him.

Angel's eyes flashed yellow at her. They were meant to be a warning, but he got the feeling she found it nothing less than amusing.

"So entertaining, Liam. Just like the humans," she smiled, voice thick with sarcasm. "I do believe that all four of us have come to either an agreement or a stalemate," she noted.

Spike's eyebrow shot up in question from where he sat on the barstool sipping his blood.

"Four?"

"Yes," Bella winked. "Angelus, Angel, Liam and me."

She was having fun dissecting Angel into the beings he had been. He did it all the time. He was always protesting that he was not Angelus. Well, two could play at that game. And Bella was very good at games... she always won.

Angel let out a low growl as Spike burst into laughter.

"You make him sound like a bloody nutter," he observed with a smirk.

Angel shot his grandchilde a warning glare. They didn't know anything about how he had worked so hard to separate himself from the beast within. And Liam had died the night that Darla had drained him. He wanted nothing to do with that useless ponce.