Chapter 14
What Charles thought he saw, in the fading light between evening and nightfall when everything through the windshield is colored Haze Grey, was a Native American girl standing sentinel before a village of teepees, with sooty plumes from a campfire (Smoke signals?) rising into the air behind her. As their van moved closer, the girl waved at them and sprinted back up the drive, and he realized that she was Asian, not Native, and that the teepees were actually motel rooms and the smoke was the issue of a Weber barbecue grill.
"Did I mention you won't be staying at the Hyatt?" Michael Wight chuckled from behind the wheel.
"Hey, any port in a storm, man. We're just glad you're takin' us in."
The van angled and pulled up to the office. Gunn and Angel dropped from the doors on its right side. Spike rose from a lawn chair. And Winifred stood on the porch, smile lighting her entire face and tears in her eyes.
Gunn was the first to break the silence.
"Oh, lord, Babygirl. Aren't you sump'in."
Forty-five minutes later they were gathered again, at the picnic table and its satellite ring of folding chairs and TV dinner trays. Drifting in to join them were the demon-hunters of Ass Crack. Their appetites had been sated with hamburgers, underdone quail, and bird blood, and now they all slumped comfortably. Only Angel seemed to still be on edge, but that, Michael had concluded a mere half-hour after meeting him, was his usual state of mind anyway.
"Damn, when was the last time we got to kick back like this?" Gunn tossed Singh's cat a morsel and sighed blissfully. "Y'all got it nice here."
It does help keep things in balance," Michael agreed. "I don't doubt there's been many a night when we've all seen and done things that would make thy knotted and combined locks to part."
Kay, still impeccably dressed and neatly wiping steak sauce from her fingers, added, "One of my coworkers at the bank is always commenting on how germy and dirty currency can be...sometimes I have to bite my tongue to keep from telling her that you don't know dirt until you've had a giant possessed earthworm's butt blow up in your face."
"Have any problems checking out of the hospital, Charles?" Paloma asked the newcomer.
"Nope. We about half-convinced 'em I was a street person who got jumped somewhere and couldn't remember a whole lot, and that Angel and Mike ran a homeless shelter. Oh, hey..." Gunn produced a patient identification bracelet from his pocket and handed it to Fred. "Brought you a souvenir."
Fred beamed and examined the plastic band. "Why, thank you...Flynn, comma, Errol..."
She smiled politely and confusedly. Angel darted his eyes away and muttered, "I liked his movies."
Thu took a Polaroid snapshot of him. "Wasn't he some gay guy who wore tights?"
"No, that was Superman." He turned to his hosts. "We can't stay. We're putting you in danger by being here."
Paloma raised a wry eyebrow. "Yeah, this was a clean, safe hellmouth until you guys showed up."
Angel shook his head. "You don't understand how powerful these people are. And they're relentless. Sooner or later they'll track us down, and you'll be caught in the crossfire. This place is such small potatoes that you don't even register on the Senior Partners' radar, but you will if they discover that you're harboring fugitives from them."
"It's gonna be the same wherever you go. And yeah, they're big but they're not God. They've got shelf lives and expiration dates and Achilles' heels just like everybody else does." Paloma's teeth sank into a piece of pink, bleeding quail flesh and she chewed thoughtfully. "I don't mind takin' our chances with you."
"Nor do I," Michael said quietly.
"Me either." Thu fired the camera again.
"In for a penny, in for a pound," Kay smiled.
Singh said, "We're out of beer."
"Not it."
"Not it."
"Not it."
"Not it."
"Not old enough."
"Hey, that ain't fair," Gunn protested. "Nobody told us the Beer Run rules."
"Ignorance of the law is no excuse," Kay informed him, tossing him an ignition key. Spike grinned and stood up.
"Keep your seat, Charlie; I'll go. You gits are liable to get lost and fall into the Grand Canyon."
"Spike..." Angel began, but the younger vampire ignored him and strolled away.
They don't realize, he thought helplessly. They're like we were once, jumping into a current they think they can swim. I won't lead another group to disaster. It's me the Partners really want...if I'm alone when they catch me they may be satisfied and let the others be.
He looked at Fred, tidying up the grill, in khaki shorts and a little tank top with her hair pulled back in a ponytail. She was humming softly to herself and smiling. I'll protect her this time. Not going to grow complacent and-
She turned as Spike drew abreast of her, and her expression startled Angel: it was the same look of shy adoration she had frequently given him after he'd rescued her in Pylea. She said something; "Hurry back," it sounded like. Spike replied something in kind and kissed her on the mouth, then continued on toward the parking lot.
"Sonofabitch!" Gunn gasped, lurching from his chair and sending Singh's tabby flying. He stared at the spot where his hand had been resting, the spot where a small yellow scorpion now clambered. "Thing almost stung me!"
Thu took an empty cup and nudged the creature into it. "Come on, Mister Pokey," she said into the cup as she carried it to the far edge of the yard and shook it out over the brush.
"You're lettin' it GO?" Gunn squawked.
Thu rolled her eyes melodramatically. "I don't slay everything."
Spike was almost to the truck when Angel caught up with him.
"Spike."
"Sorry, Angel, I agree with them. The alliance thing AND the need for more beer."
"You and Fred." Angel's voice was low and tense, his face stony with disapproval. "You shouldn't have...Spike, she's vulnerable right now. The last thing she needs is you sweet-talking her into some crazy fling."
Spike stared at him. "THAT'S what you're on about? Lions and tigers and bears breathin' down our necks and your big concern is who Fred's dating? You need to get your priorities straight, Mate." He shook his head in disgust. "And not that it's any of your bloody business, but we're not having a 'fling.' I love her."
"It doesn't matter how you feel; it's what's best for her that's important."
Spike scoffed irritably. "God, but you're a piece of work! After everything we've gone through, you still can't bear the thought of one of your harem preferring me. Nothing I do'll ever make me good enough, will it? Well, screw your notion that you 'n I are damned to Hell and not fit to be happy."
He jerked open the truck's door. Then suddenly he wheeled around again, and his face was a canvas of hurt and resentment and fear.
"Don't take her away from me. Not this one. You got all the others." He hissed the words through clinched teeth, and his voice almost broke. "Just...don't."
He held his old rival's gaze angrily for several seconds. Finally Angel dropped his eyes - whether in concession or contrition he couldn't tell - and walked wordlessly away.
The moon hung high and white overhead when the party broke up, and the members of the tribe trailed back to their respective vehicles and domiciles. As they reached the cabins Fred turned to Gunn and then to Angel, and gave them each a warm hug.
"I'm so glad you're both here. Good night."
Spike waited, silent, still; felt the knife in his gut twist a quarter-turn ("I just wanna bask.") When she returned to his side he slipped a quick, proprietary arm around her and guided her through their doorway.
"I told them about us," she said happily.
He tried to make his voice nonchalant. "Yeah? What'd they say?"
"Charles was fine with it. He likes you a lot. And Angel was...Angel." She rolled her eyes and grinned. "He really didn't say anything; just made that face of his...the one that looks like he's trying to pass a kidney stone."
The arm around her visibly relaxed. He patted her rump and released her, and crossed to the little closet to shed his shirt and footwear.
Fred sat down on the edge of the bed to remove her own shoes and watched him from beneath lowered lashes. Hard, lean muscles bunched and flexed as he emptied his pockets on the bureau, unbuttoned the fly of his jeans. Tender as he was with her, she knew that a superhuman wildness lay just below that surface, co-existing with the tenderness somehow, usually held in check but always, always there. It had emerged last night, in the shadows of the dance hall and later, here in the motel room. At the height of lovemaking, when he held her straddled in his lap with his lips on her throat, she'd caressed his head and discovered that he was in demon face. He might have bitten her, turned her, but she didn't care because the hard fullness in her was so achingly good, was all that mattered, was so intense that she thought it would split her apart.
And he won't turn me, I know that; as strong and ferocious and dangerous as I know he's capable of being, he won't hurt me.
And she'd breathed into his ear and clutched his back and shoulders and been engulfed in a surge of release.
He won't hurt me. Or anyone else who doesn't deserve it.
I love this man.
Mine. My girl. This darling girl belongs to me. Wants to belong to me. Wants me to be her man.
He had trouble wrapping his brain around it. Love wasn't simple and easy like this; the Brownings of the world were pipe dreamers. Love danced on the end of a string like a carrot, just beyond your reach; try to hold it and it fought and spit and left thorns embedded in your flesh. ("Naughty Willie, don't be cross; Daddy only wanted a kiss. I spread jam on it and dropped it butterside down on the carpet.")
Unseen in the bureau's mirror, he watched Fred watching him. What was it Pavayne had seen in her and wanted a taste of - "wet, sweet passion"? (And I'll rip your throat out if you ever touch her, you sack of shit.) The fop had been right, for all he was disgusting. She was a passionate little creature, and her kitten-like scratches were every bit as arousing as the violence of Spike's former bed-partners. Better, in fact, now that he gave it some thought. No grand dramatics or screaming bloodlust. Just this pretty little wisp of a bird who bit by bit he'd bared his heart to.
Why does a man do what he mustn't? To be hers.
Maybe I shouldn't interfere. She's an adult; she can do what she wants.
But she doesn't know Spike the way I do. She doesn't know the things he was capable of, she hasn't seen the things we- he did. Doesn't understand that the call to feed never stops, that a soul doesn't change it. Souls WON'T wash away our sins. Doesn't he GET that?
There were men in the world who seemed to land on their feet like cats, Angel reflected, regardless of what they were thrown from. And they waltzed through the world following everything but Good Sense, never pondering the consequences.
She's a grown woman. It's her business.
At least he wasn't slathering his habitual Aren'tICharming on her, Angel had to give him that. In fact he'd actually been solicitous and protective all evening, the way he'd always been with Dru. With Buffy...?
There's nothing I wan- need to know about that.
Something had happened, though. Spike had been able to harness his demon somehow. Had embraced it, even, and STILL retained his humanity. And was able to love with or without a soul.
Why couldn't I?
Traffic passed in the distance, the sound carrying over the desert floor and through the hrumm of the cabin's air conditioner.
Connor's out there. And Nina. Does she have to use the shackles now, or did she find another cage...
I tire of formlessness.
I tire of floating.
I want the shell again.
Author's Note: The line "thy knotted and combined locks to part" is from Act I, Scene V, of the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, 1600.