A/N : Little more Spike/Buffy interaction for you in this one...
(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)

Chapter 5 - Crash and Burn

Buffy slammed into the house and went straight upstairs to her room, not at all surprised to find her mother wasn't home yet. As she reached her bedroom door she found her sister in there and her face hardened.

"What do you think you're doing?" she snapped, perhaps more harshly than she needed to as she threw her gym bag on the floor and stalked over to where Dawn was rifling through a pile of clothing.

"You weren't here and I wanted to borrow your blue cashmere sweater" the younger girl admitted, "It's not like you wear colours these days anyway"

"That is so not the point!" Buffy snapped, pulling said item of clothing away from her sister, "You don't touch my stuff, okay?" she yelled, pushing her towards the door, "In fact, don't even come in my room unless I say so"

"God you are so unhinged!" Dawn snapped back, "I wanted to borrow a sweater is all, it's not like I wouldn't have given it back, hello, I'm your sister not a burglar" she said, sounding equal parts hurt and angry.

"I know that" Buffy replied, her tone softening just a little, "I just... I'm having a bad day is all" she admitted sitting down heavily on the end of her bed.

"You wanna talk?" Dawn asked awkwardly as she watched her older sister put her face in her hands, then run her fingers back through her hair as she glanced up.

"No" she shook her head eventually, "It's... you wouldn't understand"

"Maybe I would" Dawn tried again, hovering by the door, "If you never tell me stuff, you'll never know if I might understand" she pointed out.

"Do you remember your Dad?" Buffy said, not actually looking at her sister when she said it. It was unlikely Dawn had very many memories of her father, she'd been just four when he left and he'd barely been mentioned since.

"Not much" she admitted, coming further into the room and sitting beside Buffy, "It's all kinda vague"

"I don't remember mine at all" the blonde admitted, "I don't think he ever even saw me... He might have stayed with Mom if I..."

"If you hadn't been born?" Dawn guessed that was what she meant, "Buffy, you can't blame yourself for being born, that's insane" she told her sister, who focused on the floor and the walls, anything so she didn't have to face the person she was talking to.

"I know" she sighed, "I just... my mind wanders sometimes, I get thinking about the past and the ways things are, the way I am. It might have been different if my Dad had stayed, or even yours" she said softly, "Y'know it's exactly twelve years today that Hank left"

Dawn felt like she ought to have known that, he was her father after all, but then Buffy had been older and known him better. As ridiculous as it was she was almost jealous of her for that.

"Mom says we're better off without our fathers" the brunette sighed, "She thinks we're better off without guys altogether but, they're not all bad, right Buffy?" she checked.

The blonde shook her head slightly as her mind sped through all the men that had been a part of her life. It was a fairly short list but every single one had left, fathers, friends, boyfriends.

"I don't know, Dawnie" she admitted as she looked at her, pushing the younger girls hair back over her shoulder, "I'd like to think there are nice guys in the world but... I really don't know"

Spike wasn't one for taking threats to heart. Though he'd seen what Buffy could do in terms of smacking him down, her advice to leave her alone was swiftly ignored. He loved a challenge and Miss Summers was that alright, besides he was getting paid for this too, and there was no bad in that.

Unbeknownst to Buffy, Spike had followed a few steps behind as she'd come out of school, with the brunette girl he'd seen her spar with. They talked about some girl-band music they liked and compared the amount of damage they'd each caused to the other members of their after-school club as they headed out across the parking lot and climbed into a car.

"Bugger" Spike swore, knowing that he could easily keep up with them on his motorcycle but also that he was likely to get spotted and that he could do without right now. It wouldn't do for the girl to think he was a stalker or whatever, she had to like him well enough to date him after all or the money for Liam Angelus would stop abruptly. Spike did like the idea of bleeding the rich git dry, his type just loved themselves a little too much for his taste.

With his in-the-process-of-being-earned cash, Spike drove into town and parked his motorcycle outside the corner store. He was running short on cigarettes and hoped he might be able to charm some unsuspecting shop girl into selling him a bottle of Jack Daniel's finest too. He didn't need to smoke and drink most of the time, and the anger he felt at the world was not as often present as it might appear to be, but the cigarettes and the alcohol consumption had become a habit, part of his look and reputation too, so he didn't plan on giving up any time soon.

A screech of tyres caught his attention as he was about to pay for his goods and he swung round just in time to see an ugly jeep type car pull up a little to close to the shop window, and also far too close for Spike's comfort to his precious bike.

"Stupid bleedin' idiot!" he yelled as he stormed out of the shop, abandoning his almost-purchases on the counter. He let the door clang shut behind him, almost shattering the glass with the force, just as the owner of the geek machine disembarked.

"You!" Buffy said in unison with the stunned bleached blond.

"You always yell at people when they're trying to park a car?" Buffy snapped angrily, hands on her hips as she glared at Spike.

"I do when I think they're going to cause a bleedin' accident!" he yelled back, "You could've seriously buggered my bike there, luv" he pointed out, gesturing to his transport which was thankfully unscathed.

"See how much I do not care" Buffy said with a shrug as she headed past him into the store to fetch the groceries her Mom had sent her out for in the first place. It was only her volunteering for the task that had allowed her take the car out at all. Though she'd miraculously passed her test and now held a drivers licence, cars and Buffy were still unmixy things.

She was surprised when Spike caught hold of her arm and pulled her back from the door. When she turned to yell at him some more she found he was incredible close and staring at her with an intense look in his eyes.

"You're not afraid of me are you?" he said, tilting his head slightly.

"Why would I be?" Buffy replied without missing a beat, "Cos y'know if there's a reason please tell me so I can get to the running with terror already" she rolled her eyes, words dripping sarcasm as she tore her arm from his grasp and turned away.

"So if you're not afraid of me..." Spike said as he followed her into the store, "Reckon it must be cos you fancy me, pet" he smirked, as the shop girl from before overheard and giggled. If Buffy didn't find the bleached blond attractive, she certainly did.

"Obviously my attempts to cover my desire are pointless and futile" Buffy continued with the theme of sarcasm as Spike followed her around the store, "I want you so bad, baby" she said flatly, as if she were saying any regular sentence, tossing a few items into a basket and heading to the counter to pay for her goods.

"So, what then?" Spike asked, leaning on the counter and continuing to bug Buffy, "You not even gonna talk to me now?"

"That depends" the blonde shrugged, "You got a more exciting topic of discussion than the greatness of you?" she asked and his smirk grew.

"Was that a compliment, luv?" he checked, "Cos y'know you don't have to skirt round the issue, just tell me how you really feel"

Buffy rolled her eyes as she paid for her mother's groceries, picked up the bag and headed for the door without a word. She stopped and turned back briefly before she completely left.

"Oh Spike" she smiled sweetly, "Did you show the nice girl your ID before she sold you the Jack?" she asked faux-innocently as she finally left and the girl behind the counter frowned, moving the bottle away from him.

"Bitch" Spike muttered about Buffy as he swiftly paid for the cigarettes he was allowed to buy and headed out after the girl he still had to get a date with somehow. She was royally pissing him off but he was getting paid for a service and he didn't go back on a deal. Besides she was still hot and the fact she wasn't scared of him was attractive too - so few people faced up to him like she seemed willing to.

Spike arrived outside just as Liam Angelus pulled his car up behind Buffy's, blocking her exit. She leaned out of the window to curse at him, but Angel pretended he didn't hear her as he got out of his vehicle and headed towards the store, paying little or no attention to the blonde's protests, or to Spike who looked on in amusement. He actually burst out laughing when Buffy's head went back inside the car and the jeep suddenly lurched backwards denting the door of Angel's sports car spectacularly.

"What the hell did you do, bitch!" tall dark and forehead, as Spike had nicknamed him in his head, cursed colourfully as he ran back from the doorway of the shop to rescue his precious baby of a car.

"Did I do that?" Buffy faked innocence as she peered at him from the drivers seat of her mother's own car, "Oops"

"Oops is not a valid explanation, Buffy" Joyce snapped at her daughter as they sat opposite each other in the living room, "You cannot behave this way, causing so much damage. As if I don't have enough to deal with, now I have to pay Mr Angelus so he can get his son's car repaired" she yelled.

"Mom, I'm sorry" Buffy sighed, she genuinely hadn't meant to make her mother so mad, it was just Angel, he had this ability to make her so angry just by being within a five mile radius of her, "Won't the insurance cover it at all?" she checked.

"Oh of course, sweetheart, why didn't I think of that" her mother said sarcastically, "I'll just tell them you were having a bad day and you needed to release some tension by smashing two cars together!" she said, getting angrier by the second.

Buffy should have known her mother would never understand, but since she'd never told her the real reason she hated Angel so much, she really couldn't expect her to get it.

"I'm going to do my homework" she snapped, heading for the stairs and meeting her sister at the top.

"Connor just called me" she whined, "He said you wrecked Angel's car"

"Dawnie" Buffy sighed in annoyance, "Just leave me alone, okay?" she told her as she pushed past to her bedroom, "And if you have any functioning brain cells at all, leave the Angelus family alone too" she added as she slammed the door to her room and flopped down on the bed. As much as her sister tried to be there for her sometimes, Buffy felt as if nobody understood her at all, and despite appearances, she was getting really bored with it.

The next day at school, Spike was still smirking when he saw Angel in the halls. Buffy's outburst last night had been more than entertaining, after all anything that brought the rich poofter down a notch or two was fine by Spike. He'd take his money off him, it was too good a deal to pass up but he didn't like the bugger and figured he never would.

"Hey, Jackson!" the great lumbering idiot called when he spotted him.

"Oh that's right" Spike rolled his eyes, "Yell my name down the corridor and attract everyone's attention to your sordid little arrangements" he said sarcastically, making Angel frown.

"We won't have an arrangement much longer" he said in a low voice as he advanced on the bleached blond, "If you don't keep your end of this deal, Spike"

"Give a fella a chance, Peaches" he sighed, "Your bird you want seeing to is more than a little bit interesting" he smirked, "Don't fret though, I can handle her"

"I'm not 'fretting' or whatever" Angel pointed out, "but I paid you to go on a date with her. Watching the bitch wreck my car is not a date" he said menacingly.

Spike was unfazed.

"Look, mate" he told the slightly taller boy, "This is gonna take a little longer than I thought, but we had a deal, and I don't go back on my word" he swore, "Trouble is, might cost a little more than anticipated to get this bint to co-operate"

"I'm not paying you any more money" Angel laughed at the ridiculous concept as he turned to walk away, "Forget it"

"Forget the Little Bit then" Spike said flatly, making Angel look back at him, "I don't take out Little Miss FireBomb, your kid brother doesn't get her sister, remember?" he smirked.

"What did you say?" Connor asked as he approached the two older boys, "No way, Liam, you have to pay him" he insisted, "How else can I ever get Dawnie to go out with me?"

Stuck between the desperate look on his little brothers face and the annoying smirk on Spike's, Angel looked far from happy as he surreptitiously pulled out his wallet.

"Okay" he sighed, "How much?"

To Be Continued...