Here it is, finally! There is probably one chapter left after this one, to tie up the loose ends. Please let me know your thoughts. Thank you so much for the reviews; they are deeply appreciated, and they definitely keep me motivated to keep writing.

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It was the muffled sound of voices that roused her from her tangled dream of graveyards and pointing fingers, of scrubbing dried blood from her clothes as Spike's magic fingers explored her body, of forcing down a Doublemeat Medley with one hand as she fended off a vampire attack with the other. She sat up on the couch and squinted blearily at the TV screen, still stubbornly showing that awful movie she and Dawn had inexplicably chosen from the rental place, probably because it was mindless and simple and linear, as their lives never seemed to be, and … Dawn. She was talking to someone outside. Buffy could hear her sister's voice but not her words, the tone high-pitched and pleading … and then there was an answering voice, deep, smoke-roughened, with an unmistakable cadence that brought her heart into her throat where it began to pound madly. Was she still dreaming?

Buffy edged over to the door as if in a stupor and pressed her forehead against the cool wood, straining to hear what was going on beyond it. She couldn't quite bring herself to glance through one of the three small windows that would have given her a clear, immediate answer. It must be one of Dawn's friends, maybe that Michael guy she'd been chattering about nonstop—that is, before Spike left and her energies shifted to spouting vicious accusations at everyone she deemed responsible. That's it, Dawn must be out there talking to Michael.

"…and didn't want to see her … it will be a disaster."

There was a long silence from the other side of the door, and Buffy wondered vaguely if they could hear her heartbeat. It certainly sounded loud enough in her own ears. What was going on? Why did Dawnie sound like she was crying?

"I still hate you." Muffled, choked, barely audible.

"I'll learn to live with that."

And there it was. Buffy's breath caught in her throat, and she resisted the urge to throw the door open and fling herself into his arms—or punch him in the face. It was him. Him. He'd come back to them. More words were exchanged outside, but she ignored them as she wrestled with the confused mass of emotions that fought for control of her. She had to play it cool. That was all she had left; otherwise she would be at his mercy, and even now, knowing that she loved him and understanding the ripple-effect of that newfound knowledge, she wouldn't allow herself to give him everything. Couldn't. Not when he had the power to crush her with a word.

"Spike, don't! I'm telling you …"

Buffy's hand acted without permission from her brain. The door flung back and she stood before him, watching as the gorgeous blue eyes registered first surprise, then pleasure, then a healthy dose of anxiety. She watched him reach for words and come up with nothing, that fact itself an anomaly.

"Buffy…"

Again with the unruly hand. She didn't even realize she'd hit him until he reached up to check the damage to his lip, one side of his mouth curling in that old self-satisfied smirk, and he was about to say something that would ruin everything, maybe, open old wounds and pour salt in, when she grabbed him by the front of his coat, pulled him to her, and buried his smart-ass remark in a violent kiss.

His arms instantly went around her as he let himself revel in her taste, the tickle of her hair against his face, the warmth of her dainty but immeasurably powerful body. He didn't ever want to let go, but when his hand traveled down to the waistband of her jeans and began to slip beneath the fabric, she pulled back with a soft moan that let him know she didn't want to stop any more than he did. A spot of blood—his, from the sucker punch—glinted bright red at the corner of her mouth.

They regarded one another carefully for several moments. Buffy spoke first, slightly breathless from the kiss. "I didn't mean to hit you," she said, then hastened to add, "I'm not sorry I did it. You deserved it. I just didn't mean to."

He smiled wryly and touched his tongue to the split lip. "Caught me off my guard, Slayer," he said. "I used to be better at blocking you."

"I used to be better at … hating you."

His eyes met hers searchingly. "Do you?" he asked. "The bit does. S'pose I've earned that."

"Dawn doesn't hate you, you idiot. Dawn worships you. It just about killed her when you said those hurtful things to her, when you left."

"Just her?"

Buffy's eyes hardened. "Is that why you did it? To hurt me? Because if that's it, and you only threw my sister into the crossfire to get at me, that bloody lip is about to become the least of your problems."

"You didn't answer my question."

"You didn't answer mine."

"I didn't leave because I wanted to hurt you, Buffy. I mean, I did want that—right or wrong, I can't deny it. A man can only have his heart ripped out and handed to him in pieces so many times before gets tired enough of it to strike back. But that's not why I left. You want an explanation, I'll give you one. It might not make a damn bit of difference in the way you're feeling now, but it's all I've got. Can you withhold your judgment for a bit?"

In response, she stepped back and waited for him to come inside. He hung back, an odd, uncertain expression on his face. "What?" she prodded.

He nodded toward the door. "Niblet said—she said you'd done another spell."

"She told you we uninvited you?" Buffy asked, frowning.

Spike raised an eyebrow questioningly, then tentatively stepped forward, half expecting to slam face-first into an invisible wall. He didn't. He found himself standing in the Summers' foyer, a rush of gratitude making him want to grab her around the waist and help himself to another kiss. They hadn't shut him out.

Buffy was having none of that, though. All business she was, as she snapped off the droning television and sat down on the couch, looking up at him expectantly. He felt suddenly foolish, ashamed for some unfathomable reason, of the news he had to share.

"Buffy … I don't know how to … this isn't …" Faltering, he raised his eyes to hers hopefully, as if pleading for some kind of lifeline. He was suddenly sure that he'd made a horrible mistake, an unforgivable error in judgment. It was too much, this revelation. It would scare her off, make her run away when she glimpsed the bottomless well of his devotion. She gazed back at him impassively, the only hint of emotion in the way her hands fidgeted restlessly in her lap—a nervous habit most unlike her.

"You deserve better than a monster," he said at last. The intensity of his statement took her by surprise, and she flinched slightly at the harsh tone he used. "You told me, in the cemetery, the night I left, that I'm not one anymore. That's not true, Buffy. The things I've done—the things I still craved, the blood and the violence, even after giving you everything I had to give—they're etched into me, too deep. You thought I was tamed. You thought a chip in my head was enough to kill the monster and redeem the man. But you were wrong."

"Spike, stop with the self-flagellation. I've heard this song before, and I'm still not buying it. A monster isn't capable of love. You love me, don't you? You love Dawn. Are you trying to tell me you'd hurt us if that chip came out?"

"Never dream of it, love," he said, cringing away from the very implication. "Never you, never her. But that means bugger-all in the grand scheme."

"It does to me."

He gave a short bark of laugher, humorless and harsh. "Does it? You find comfort in that, do you? In the fact that I wouldn't harm a hair on the Niblet's head, but if given half a chance I might drain every drop from some other unfortunate girl her age who happened across my path one night? Does that really make a difference to you?"

"You wouldn't!"

"I would! … I would've."

They glared fire at one another across the living room. And slowly, slowly, something began to dawn in Buffy's mind, some weak suspicion that grew stronger and stronger as she stared him down, as his fierce demeanor began to dissolve into something akin to desperation.

"What did you do?" she whispered.

He closed his eyes and sank down onto the chair across from her. "You deserve better than a monster," he repeated.

"Spike…?"

"Hurts a hell of a lot more than the bloody chip, I'll have you know," he said, in a vain attempt to regain some of his trademark dry wit.

Buffy went to him, shakily, and knelt before his chair, taking his hands in hers and squeezing them. "Tell me," she said. "Tell me what you're talking about."

He cocked an eyebrow at her dubiously. "I think you already know, love."

Her voice was choked, husky. "I want to hear it from you."

"My soul," he said, afraid now to meet her eyes and see the disdain that was sure to be lurking there. "I went to this place in Africa, this demon I'd heard about, wicked powerful, and…" he squeezed his eyes shut briefly. "I got it back."

Her silence confirmed his fears. Now he would lose her, for good this time. Grabbing blindly for a defense mechanism to shield himself from her imminent rejection of everything he could possibly offer, he got up and began to pace the living room, still not looking at her. "Bloody stupid of me, it was. All these years poking fun at your soulboy, and what do I do but follow in his poncey footsteps. And me without even a curse to blame. Me, opening my arms wide and welcoming the torment of my own bloody accord. Shameful waste of perfectly good evil if you ask me. As if it would make you see me as worthy of your company, someone you can fit into your life and not hide away in the shadows. As if it would make a difference. As if it would be the key to your heart, or—"

"It's not."

He froze mid-stride, his head jerking up and his gaze locking onto hers in a moment of purest agony. The trials were child's play compared to this.

"Spike, listen to me. There is no key, all right? Well, Dawn … but that was last year." Her lips quirked in a near-smile, but he continued to stare at her with those intense blue eyes of his, so she went on. "There's no key to my heart, there's no spell or curse or grand gesture that could make me love you … or anyone else, for that matter. My heart's not for sale. I give my love freely, when I give it, no strings attached. It's pure, it's real. Sometimes I think it's all I've got left that is."

He opened his mouth to argue or condemn or comfort, he wasn't sure which, but she stopped him with a single raised finger.

"I thought if I allowed myself to love you, a man without a soul, then I was giving in to that darkness inside me that you've spent so much time and effort forcing me to recognize. It was okay as long as it was just about sex, or comfort, or even some passive-aggressive way to get back at my friends. I used you, and we both know it."

Spike nodded, flashing back to (Tell me you love me. There's nothing good or clean in you! Tell me you want me. I could never be your girl!) certain encounters that confirmed her words.

"But somewhere along the way, I realized something that scared me to death." She took a deep, shuddery breath, then crossed the room and stood right in front of him, looking up at him earnestly, mirroring his own fear. "I love you."

A beating heart would have stopped.

"I loved you before you left, I just didn't know how to admit it to myself or anyone else." She paused. "And now you're just staring at me and not talking, so I'm going to keep going until you decide to weigh in here … the fact that you left vowing to kill me next time we met, and instead came back with this news, it's just … Spike, that's the most incredible—" she broke off, biting her lip. "And I'm probably too late telling you how I feel, I've waited too long and been cruel too many times, and I don't know what you went through for this, but I probably wouldn't even want to imagine. I mean, Spike … your soul."

He touched the corner of her eye with his thumb, wiping away a tear that had formed there before it could fall.

"Say it again," he ordered gruffly.

He needed to watch her eyes when she said it, to witness the flicker of shame that would cloud them briefly or to catch her almost-imperceptible glance at the floor that would disprove the words even as she spoke them.

Buffy locked her eyes on his unflinchingly. "I love you, Spike."

There wasn't even a moment's hesitation.

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TBC