Disclaimer: All characters and things from ANGEL and BUFFY belong to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy. If they aren't on the show they belong to me.

Summary: Angel and Spike get a chance to get back the people that meant the most to them after the battle against Wolfram and Hart. But can they keep the real past a secret from the only people they want to share it with? A/C S/B

CHAPTER 15

Angel heard the phone ring downstairs but he didn't care. Right now all that mattered to him was the unclothed woman lying next to him. Cordelia was all that mattered. He smiled as she snuggled close to him, pulling the sheets up to her chin and clutching them in a ball.

Angel moved his arm around, pulling her close to him and allowing her to drift off to sleep in his arms. He could not believe that after all of those years he and Cordelia had finally gotten around to making love. It had seemed like an eternity's wait for him, although he knew she had no idea how long he had waited to do that. She had no idea about their past together, she had no memory of any of it.

Angel sighed as he heard the phone continue to ring. He hoped it would not wake Cordelia up. He liked watching her sleep, then he could pretend that she remembered him and how much he really loved her. He wished that someone else in the hotel would have enough brains to pick the phone up.

Wesley grumbled to himself as he made his way down the stairs of the hotel to the front desk where the phone continued to ring. He could not believe no one else had heard the phone, or if they had, had not moved to get it. After all, his room was farther from the lobby, at least compared to Gunn.

He made it to the desk, and picked up the phone, groggily. "Hello?"

"Hello? This is Spike. Is Angel there?" Spike's voice was on the end of the line.

"I'm sorry. He went to bed already." Wesley answered the man he did not remember knowing. "Would you like to leave him a message?"

"No." Spike told him. "I really need to speak to him. It's urgent."

"He is not available." Wesley repeated himself.

"Fine, what about Cordelia then?" Spike asked. "Can I talk to her?"

"She is asleep also." Wesley told Spike.

"Well, wake one of them up damn it!" Spike was getting impatient.

"I'm sorry, but it is late, and I doubt anyone with the name Spike could be an vital call." And with that Wesley hung the phone up and tiredly made his way back up the stairs to his room.

Spike stared at the receiver in his hand. He couldn't believe that Wesley had just hung up on him and, more importantly, he could not believe that Wesley had also made fun of his name. Spike stood there for another moment before slowly hanging the phone up. He then turned to see Buffy and Giles waiting for him to tell them something.

"He couldn't come to the phone." Spike said simply before making his way into the library.

"What?" Buffy was confused. "What do you mean he couldn't come to the phone?"

"One of the guys he rooms with said he couldn't come to the phone." Spike said.

"What about Cordelia?" Giles asked.

"She was evidently sleeping too." Spike said.

"Spike! Angel is going to be arrested and Cordelia is going to be brought back here if we don't do something! You needed to warn them!" Buffy couldn't believe Spike had just given up like that.

"And I will." Spike said, gathering his jacket up.

"What do you mean?" Giles asked. "How can you?"

"I'm going to L.A." Spike said simply.

Buffy let Spike's words register and then shook her head. "No you're not. We both are."

"What? We can't. You have to stay and fight the vampires." Spike reminded her.

"Cordelia is my best friend." Buffy told him. "I need to make sure she is okay first."

Spike tried not to laugh at Buffy's statement. In the old reality Spike wasn't sure Buffy would even consider Cordelia a friend, let alone her best one, but finally he nodded. "Fine. You can come. We are going to make this quick though. Into L.A. and back out before anyone realizes we are missing."

Giles nodded in agreement. "That could draw some suspicion. I will try and cover for you the best I can. But you need to be careful. Try not to let anyone see you."

"Yeah." Spike nodded at Giles and took Buffy by the hand, leading her out to his motorcycle. The ride to L.A. was not a quick one and the Sunnydale Police had already put a call out to the L.A.P.D. Spike knew time was against them if they were going to make it to Angel before the Police did.

Connor led the small group of police officers around the perimeter of the Hyperion Hotel, just in case Angel heard them and tried to escape. Connor knew that if Angel had truly kidnapped Cordelia then she was also in danger if Angel found out the place was surrounded. He had to be cautious.

Connor turned to the chief who had allowed him to be part of the case. "He's upstairs. I can almost guarantee it."

The chief nodded and pointed up the building to indicate to the rest of the police that Angel was upstairs.

"Let's move in." The chief motioned for the men to follow him into the hotel.

As Connor watched the L.A.P.D. storm into the hotel he got a sickening feeling in his stomach, and for the first time since he heard Angel had been accused of kidnapping Cordelia he did not believe the accusations. If Cordelia had really been kidnapped, why wouldn't she have tried to leave when Angel had gone out that afternoon? Why did she tell Connor she was dating Angel? Why did she kiss Angel? Why would Angel have been stupid enough to go by the police station, let alone bring Cordelia with him? And most important of all, why had Cordelia willing followed Angel up the stairs to try and comfort him when he had returned that night? Clearly she did not hate him, and if he had kidnapped her, Connor was sure Cordelia would have hated Angel. Things just weren't adding up.

Spike kicked his motorcycle as it sat in the gas station. It was taking forever to fill up, and at the rate they were going, he and Buffy would never make it to L.A. in time to warn Angel and Cordelia.

"Relax." Buffy told him. "Kicking it won't get it to fill up any faster."

"We aren't going to make it there in bloody time." Spike told her.

Buffy nodded sadly. "I know."

"And once they arrest Angel it won't matter what Cordelia says. Her parents won't listen and Xander will make sure they police don't listen to her." Spike continued.

Buffy nodded again. "I know that too."

"We are going to have to figure out a way to save Angel." Spike said.

Buffy sighed. "Yeah, well, we will sort it out when we have to."

"And when the hell did Xander become such a bloody ass?" Spike asked. As much as he had fought with Xander, he had never truly disliked him. In the old reality Xander only confronted Spike when he felt Spike wasn't doing something in the best interest of Buffy, and Spike respected Xander for that. He was a good friend to the Slayer then, now he was the farthest thing from a friend to any of them.

"He's always been like that." Buffy said. "You know that. He doesn't like to lose at anything. Especially not to Angel, and especially something as important as a girl."

"But Cordelia doesn't care about Xander anymore." Spike said.

"You think Xander cares about that?" Buffy raised an eyebrow. "It doesn't matter what Cordelia wants. It only matters what he wants. Her parents are the same way. They don't give a damn about Cordelia, all that matters is that she keeps the Chase name clean and respectable."

"That's bloody pathetic." Spike scoffed. "Cordelia is better off with Angel."

Buffy took a deep breath. "Yeah. As much as I don't want to be the first to admit it, she is."

Just then the gas pump stopped, indicating Spike's tank was full. He handed Buffy back her helmet and took a seat on his bike. "We better get going."

Buffy nodded, strapping her helmet on and then getting on the motorcycle behind Spike. He started it and took off from the gas station, causing her to grab onto him tightly as he sped down the road towards L.A. And Buffy wouldn't lie, having to be that close to Spike was not the worse thing she had ever been forced to do.

Xander sat in the living room of the Chase mansion as Mr. Chase, a tall muscular man in a business suit with dark hair and tan skin paced back and forth in front of him. Mrs. Chase sat next to Xander; she was a thin woman with short blonde hair and an orange tint to her skin. Clearly she spent too much time in the tanning salon.

"So the L.A.P.D. knows where Cordelia is?" Mr. Chase asked.

Xander nodded. "That's what the Sunnydale police said on the phone." Xander motioned to the phone next to the couch. "They said that if all goes well she will be back here in about three hours."

"Well, that's a relief." Mrs. Chase said casually as she took a sip of the wine from the glass sitting in front of her. She was not your typical mother; the fact that her daughter had supposedly been kidnapped did not really seem to faze Mrs. Chase.

"And this Angel character?" Mr. Chase asked Xander.

"What about him?" Xander asked.

"He will pay for what he has done, right?" Mr. Chase asked.

Xander smiled devilishly at Mr. Chase. "Oh yeah, he will pay." Xander would make sure of it. The Sunnydale Police were going to bring Angel back to Sunnydale for prosecution, and they were very easily influenced, not to mention they weren't the swiftest police Xander had ever met. He was sure he could persuade them into making sure Angel had a fair trial. He laughed to himself. Angel would rot for taking Cordelia from him. After all, Xander had decided long ago that if he could not have Cordelia, no one could.

Angel was awoken by a commotion downstairs in the lobby of the hotel. He sat up and looked over at Cordelia. Clearly the noise had woken her up as well, because she sat up in bed next to him, covering her breast with the sheet.

"What's going on down there?" Cordelia asked Angel.

Angel shook his head. "I don't know." He got out of bed and threw his boxers on. "I'll go see. You stay here."

Cordelia nodded and watched Angel walk out the door, a minute later Angel was thrown back into the room by two L.A.P.D. Cordelia let out a scream as she watched them slam Angel against the wall, holding his head in place and reading him his rights as they handcuffed his hands behind his back.

"What the hell is going on?" Angel asked.

"You're under arrest for the kidnapping of Cordelia Chase." Connor entered the room followed by the chief of police. Connor looked over at Cordelia who was sitting up in bed, clearly in shock, with the sheet held tightly around her naked body. Her eyes seemed to be begging Connor not to take Angel from her. In that moment, Connor was almost certain that Angel had not kidnapped Cordelia.

"Not only kidnapping, but apparently rape as well." The chief of police tilted his head toward Cordelia.

"He did not-" Cordelia started but was cut off by the chief.

"It's alright Miss. He can't hurt you anymore." The chief told her.

"He didn't-" Cordelia started again as her voice cracked. She was beginning to panic.

"Cordelia." Angel tried to calm her down. "It will be alright. Okay? Everything is going to be fine."

"Not for you, buddy." One of the cops turned Angel and pulled his cuffs tight. "You're going to be spending a long time in jail, thinking about what you've done."

"I haven't done anything." Angel said.

"That's not what the Sunnydale Police said." The chief told Angel.

"Sunnydale?" Cordelia stood, wrapping the sheet around herself tightly.

The chief nodded. "Thanks to a Mr. Alexander Harris we were able to find you, Miss Chase." He then turned to the rest of the police in the room. "Now, why don't we get Mr. Angel out of here, and get Miss Chase to a hospital."

The two men holding Angel nodded and began moving Angel out of the room.

"No! This isn't right! He didn't do anything!" Cordelia rushed forward before anyone could stop her, grabbing Angel's face and kissing his lips as hard as she could.

Angel kissed her back with everything he had. He didn't care if she remembered him or not, he loved her anyway, and the reality of not being able to be with her because of some story Xander had made up scared Angel to death. And that fear turned into passion, and that passion turned into something else. Angel felt it as Cordelia pulled away from him. He felt as though a little piece of himself had left when Cordelia's lips had left. He had no idea that it really had.

Cordelia starred at Angel dumbly for a minute, and then it all hit her like a truck. Worse then any vision she had ever had. The pain, the passion, the love, the hurt, the laughs, the cries, the lies, the forgiveness, the death; all of it hit her. All of the memories.

Cordelia watched as the police began pushing Angel out of the room.

"Angel!" Cordelia suddenly called out.

Angel turned to her and he saw it immediately in her eyes. Those were the eyes of the Cordelia Chase he had called his best friend for so long. He smiled at her. "Cordy? You…"

"Remember?" Cordelia narrowed her eyes at him, trying her best to be stern with him. "Oh yeah, buddy! I remember! And you have so much explaining to do!"

"Lorne! Spike! They know too! They remember!" Angel called after her, trying not to laugh as the police dragged him out of the room. Sure, his only son who didn't actually remember being his son was arresting him, but it didn't matter. All that mattered was that Cordelia remembered. Somehow, Cordelia had gotten her memory back.