Author: Calex

Title: Death

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: I own nothing, Dawn belongs to Joss, Dorian belongs to… Oscar Wilde, originally.

Notes: For the TtH FicForAll

Pairing: Dawn/Dorian

Death

"It's cold out here, what are you doing outside?"

How did he do that? Make goosebumps appear on her skin just by being in the same room as she was? It was disconcerting, his effect on her, it made the very air thick with the tension she felt at seeing him, feeling him. He was far too attractive for his own good, she'd always had a thing for his type. He was like Spike and Angelus mixed together in a slightly less sociopathic, but still sinister and sensual package. He was delicious… and she'd always had a soft spot for beautiful things. But not with this one, never with this one. She couldn't fall for this one because he would be far worse to her peace of mind than all of the others put together. She didn't turn to look at him, just looked out into the night sky, arms wrapped around herself to block the cool night air. Hell with "cool", it was freezing, and he knew it. Her breath was forming before her very eyes and there was nothing she could do to hide her shivers. She heard him sigh and closed her eyes, sure that he would leave, now, as he always had done before. Her eyes snapped open in shock as he closed the door behind him… and stepped up next to her on the balcony.

"What are you doing out here?" he asked again, softly. He'd stepped up so he was next to her, not even bothering with the pretence that it was the sky he was looking at, because his full attention was on her. Dawn sighed and her head dropped, stray strands of hair falling into her face and the bareness of her long, smooth neck was bared to him. Out of habit, a hand unconsciously went to her neck, rubbing a scar at the side of it, a tribute of a vamp that had nearly got there.

"I needed to be alone," she said, finally, still not looking at him. There, a not-so-subtle telling him of her need for him to be away. He didn't take the obvious hint, just kept on looking at her, leaning his side against the railing on the edge of the balcony, his ankles crossed elegantly.

"It's unhealthy to be alone," he said, and she shivered again. That voice was sin… and he knew it. He used it to his own advantage, that wonderful voice. She looked up, finally, and saw that his gaze was still on hers and their eyes locked and she felt trapped, frozen, unable to pull away. His eyes were great, bottomless depths of nothingness, a black hole that threatened to suck her soul away. Dawn used every little bit of her strength of will to pull away from that gaze. She was left shaken, though, staring at her hands, her breathing ragged.

"Is anything about my life healthy?"

"Not to the mind, no," he sounded amused. "I can't but say the same for my own as well."

A corner of her mouth went up, and she glanced up again, looking at the full moon that graced the inky black velvet night sky, dotted as it was by the diamond bright stars. For a second, she forgot about him, about the cold, and was lost in a place that was like a land of waking dream, but what she saw or dreamt she couldn't remember, because the very next moment she was jolted by the feel of him sliding his dinner jacket onto her shoulders. She turned large eyes to him.

"Dorian, you'll freeze."

"Invincible man," he reminded her, amused again, but he was starting to shiver. That blue silk shirt of his wasn't any help against the cold of the English December night sky. She shook her head, made the remove the jacket, but his hand on hers stopped her movements. She froze, the feel of his warm skin on hers a shock. He was warm… sometimes it was hard to remember that. She sometimes expected him to be cold, it would suit him better. But no, he was warm, despite his so-called "immortality". He'd died, Dorian Gray, but Wolfram & Hart had needed him, and they had brought him back. And there he was, alive, and helping them. Warm. So warm, and she had not felt the warmth for so long. She shivered under his touch. That hand travelled up her arm, across her shoulder, and finally traced from the outer edge of her jaw to her chin, tilting her face up to his. Subtle seduction, it had been going on for far too long. She didn't know how long she could withstand his brand of seduction before she combusted from the heat that he wrought in her. "You avoid me."

"Do you blame me?" she gasped out, her throat so dry she found it hard to breathe. She made herself swallow, made herself wet that throat so she could speak. She tried to look away, didn't want to meet those eyes because she knew that if she did, the combination of his look and his touch would shatter her into a million pieces, and she was already oh-so-close to the point of shattering. He would allow for none of that, and kept his touch on her chin still gentle, but firm, and so she had to settle with keeping her gaze downcast.

"Dawn," he said softly, and her name rolling on his tongue sounded sinfully delicious. How was it that he could make her body sing just by saying her name like that, his voice husky and low and like warm chocolate sliding over her naked skin. Chocolate… or velvet. They had played the game too far. In a moment of panic that derived from the smallest bit of her mind that was left rational, she realised that this was the point, the end. She'd played with fire when it came to Dorian, though she had resisted. She had brought his attention to her, how she didn't know, but she had and that was enough in his books to say that she'd played with him. And oh the goddess, how he played. She felt like she was drowning. One of his hands rested on her shoulder, then slid slowly, sinuously down to rest just above her breast and she fell. In that moment, with that thought, she was gone. Lost. "Mistletoe."

She looked down, hazily, and sure enough he had pinned a little bit of a mistletoe on the lapel of his jacket. He'd planned this, all along he had planned this. He had probably even known she was going to get away from him by going out by herself. She'd played right into his hand and at that moment, she couldn't care if she did because it was at that moment that his silky lips dropped to hers like a whisper of some divine, sinister being.

Dawn felt like dying. Buffy was wrong, death wasn't her gift; it was a Summers girl's gift.