"The crystal of what?" Giles quipped

"The crystal of Iklor. It's the ... I guess brother is the best way I can explain it to my amulet. Just like the amulet allows me to access my true power, the crystal will do the same to him." Ember explained.

"How do we find it?" Buffy said

Ember held up her amulet by the chain with her thumb.

"With this. My amulet will react when the crystal is near. "

Spike turned to Ember.

"Didn't your amulet do something weird when we were in Vegas?"

She jumped to her feet.

"Son of a bitch, it did, didn't it? I'm so stupid! That means the crystal was somewhere in Vegas!"

"Talk about a needle in a haystack." Xander interjected.

"How close does it have to be to the crystal to react to it?" Giles asked

"Well, in the same city... I guess? But the closer I get to it, the stronger the reaction will be." Ember said

"So we get to go back to Vegas?" Andrew asked.

"Yes, Andrew. " Giles said with a sigh.

"Yay!" He exclaimed as he clapped happily.

"We'll leave at dawn, that should give everyone time to prepare. " Buffy said.

"Alright then, that means we'd better get back, pet, we got work to do." Spike said as they stood.

"Spike ... can I talk to you for a minute? Alone?" Buffy said as she glanced at Ember.

"It's okay, wait outside for me, I shouldn't be long." He said as he winked at her.

She wordlessly watched them head to the back of the RV before she exited to wait outside.

"She really cares about you." Buffy said once they were alone.

"And I really care about her." He said as he shot her an apologetic look.

Buffy shook her head as she took hold of his hands

"I know at one time we ... had something and I'll always care for you, but you've found the person... creature... whatever ... that you're meant to be with."

Spike chuckled.

"And how can you possibly know that?"

She shot him an exasperated look.

"Anyone with eyes can see how the two of you look at each other. You'd better take care of her though, she looks like she's one of the good ones. "

"You're damn right she is, better than I bloody deserve that's for sure. " he replied as they shared a hug.

"Remember, if you mess this up, I'm going to give you the ass kicking of your life." Buffy said in parting.

Spike laughed as he playfully saluted her before heading outside.

"You were in there for a while, everything okay?" Ember asked him as they walked back to their RV.

He smiled at her as he put an arm around her shoulders.

"Jus' closin' one chapter of my life so I can start writin' a new one."

Buffy smiled to herself as she stood at the window and watched them walk away.

"They actually make quite a charming couple, don't they?" Giles said as he came to stand beside her, his hands wrapped around a steaming mug of tea.

While on their escapades through Europe a while back, Buffy had come across another 'kiss the librarian' mug sitting in the window of a little shop in France and she bought it for him, his reaction when he opened the box still brought a smile to her face every time she thought about it.

"And how are you doing? I know you cared for him." Giles said.

"I still do, and probably always will, but ultimately, I want him to be happy and look at him, I can't remember the last time I saw him that happy." She replied

"This never gets old." Andrew said as they passed by the glittering Vegas strip.

"Well don't get too excited, my dude because this isn't a vacation. We're here on business." Xander said.

"There will be plenty of time to have fun after we save the world." Buffy said as they pulled into an RV park about ten minutes outside the city.

Andrew turned to look at her, his expression hopeful.

"Promise?"

Buffy laughed in spite of herself.

"Yes, Andrew, I promise."

"O ... Okay ... I'm gonna hold you to that, you know." He warned her

Ember pulled in some distance behind, they parked several spaces away from one another, as not to look too conspicuous.

As soon as they had neared the city limits, her necklace had begun to glow and she breathed a sigh of relief. At least the crystal was still in the city somewhere.

Ember put the RV in park and rubbed her eyes wearily.

The sun had set and she knew Buffy would want to have a meeting, but all she wanted to do was lay down and sleep for a year.

Spike was at her side in an instant.

"You okay, pet?" He asked as he knelt in front of her.

"Yeah, just tired. Not physically, mentally, and feeling a little embarrassed. I had a chance to stop Iklor for good over a millenia ago and I didn't do it. Now a lot of innocent people might suffer because of my mistake." She said sadly.

Spike stood and pulled her into a hug.

"We all do things we regret, look at me, I've probably done more bad things than everyone put together." He said.

She nodded ruefully as she pulled back to look at him

"That is true."

"Hey...!" He replied indignantly.

She laughed.

"Relax, my sexy night stalker, it was only a joke."

He raised an eyebrow.

"You think I'm sexy?" He quipped.

She shot him an exasperated look.

"Spike, you know I do."

He flashed her that predatory grin of his.

"Yeah, but I love hearin' you say it." He said as he kissed her.

He couldn't stop the growl that escaped him as her delicious heat flowed into him.

"Spike ... We can't... They're waiting for us." She said as he pulled at the collar of her shirt and plundered every inch of exposed skin he could reach.

"They can wait." He growled into her ear.

He almost had her convinced when there was a sudden loud knock on their door.

"Ember! Spike! Get the lead out! Buffy's waiting for you!" Came Xander's muffled voice.

"I don't have the chip anymore you know, I COULD kill him." Spike growled.

Ember barked out a laugh.

"I don't think that would go over very well. Come on, the sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can get back here." She said suggestively

Spike strode quickly to the door.

"Then what the bloody hell are we waiting for?" He said.

"Thanks for being here, I know you all are tired since we had to kind of red eye it from Cleveland." Buffy said.

"Well, it's not like monkey boy here gave us any choice, did he?" Spike said.

"Hey...!" Xander said indignantly.

"I'm sorry about that, but we need a game plan to find this thing."

"Kennedy and I could talk to the wiccan community here and ask if anyone's heard of any strange artifacts that might have shown up." Willow said.

"I know a few blokes here that might know things." Spike said.

"Good, and the girls and I will hit up all the oddity shops we can." Buffy said.

"Well, Andrew, I suppose that leaves you and I to visit all the magic shops we can and see if we can find any text that might be of help to us." Giles said.

"Oh goody." Andrew said sarcastically.

"Thank you everyone, now go and get some rest because we have a big day tomorrow." Buffy said.

"We still got loads of time before sunrise, what'd you say we have a look around." Spike said.

She grinned at him. "I was thinking the same thing."

He put his arm around her and pulled her close.

"That's why I love you, pet, we think alike."

"Now, it's been a spell since I've been here, but I think I remember this bloke that might be able to tell us something. " he said as they walked down a dark, foul smelling alley.

They reached a door that appeared to be the one of the service doors to one of the casinos, and Spike knocked three times, pausing a few seconds between knocks.

They waited for what seemed like a fortnight, then the door suddenly swung open and a huge creature loomed in the doorway.

"Spike! How in the hell are ya man! Come in! Come in!" He said as he ushered them both inside.

Ember was shocked to see that the seemingly abandoned casino wasn't abandoned at all.

"You got quite the set up here, Larry." Spike said

The creature called Larry shrugged

"We try, its getting harder with the city ramping up its demos of the old casinos." He said as he stopped walking

"I would ask you if you wanted to play some poker, but I get the drift that this isn't a social call. " he said

Spike's expression sobered as he turned to Ember.

"Why don't you explain, pet." He said

She told him what they were looking for, and showed him a picture she had discretely torn from one if Giles' books.

"It's very important that we find it, can you tell us anything?"

Larry's face fell.

"Unfortunately I haven't seen anything like that, but if its odd or apparently cursed there's only a few places that deal in that stuff and ironically, they're all run by humans." He said

"I'm quite familiar with the nature of humans, mate, trust me when I say that don't surprise me at all. " Spike said.

Ember snapped her fingers.

"One of those places is owned by that dude who has that paranormal show on TV, remember the one we watched the other day?" She said to Spike.

Larry's eyebrows shot into his hairline as he looked amusingly at Spike.

"We?" He quipped.

Spike chose to ignore him

"Oh yeah... I remember reading about that place, the humans find it interesting. " he said.

"My gut says we should start there." Ember said

Spike flashed her that adorable, cocky grin of his, the one that made him look infuriatingly handsome.

"Then that's where we'll start first thing tonight. " he said as he looked at his watch, and was disappointed to see that it was almost dawn.

"Oh shit! Yeah, come on, we have a ways back and it's almost dawn." She said as she hurried out of the old casino to their car.

Spike made to follow when Larry caught his arm.

"Hey ... she looks like a good one, don't screw it up." He said as he gave him a look

Spike grinned at him

"Oh don't you worry about that, mate, I don't plan to." He said as he followed her out.

"You never do." Larry whispered sadly after him.