Underneath the Grief - Part 6

We gathered in my office when we got back to Wolfram and Hart where Eve paced between Spike and me, while Gunn was still on the phone making calls. "I can't believe you brought me here," she said, crossing her arms as she walked toward me. "This is the first place they're going to look for me."

"You're under my protection now, Eve," I said, leaning back against the desk. "They can't touch you."

"That's what you think, Angel," she looked positively panicked.

"Oi! Didn't you say you'd have information for us, luv?" I felt an odd twinge of jealousy when Spike used that pet name. I know he does it all the time, that it doesn't mean anything. But he didn't start calling me that until after we kissed.

"Right, fine," she said unhappily. "What do you want to know?"

I looked at her for a moment before asking, "What are you?"

"What do you mean, boss? I'm just a liaison. I liaise."

"You're not just anything, Eve. You're not human, so what are you?"

She sighed, looking between me and Spike before she answered. "I'm a child of the Senior Partners. Created to do their bidding."

"You're an immortal," said Spike, like it was something he had been expecting to hear. Eve nodded, eyes wide.

I got up and crossed the room, standing over her. "What are they, Eve? What are the Senior Partners?"

"Do you really think I have access to that information, Angel?"

"If you are part of them, you should have some clues." She opened and closed her mouth soundlessly.

"Ugh, give it up, mate," Spike said. "She doesn't know anything."

"I might," Eve whined. "I might know a lot, but I don't have access to that information."

"So saving you from this thing the Senior Partners sent after you was all for nothing?"

"If you wanted to know about the Senior Partners, you should have asked Lindsey before you sent him away. He's devoted his life to the study of the Senior Partners. He'd know much more than I do."

"But the Senior Partners took him," I pointed out. "We have no way of knowing whether he's alive or not."

"Oh, he's alive," she said. "They'd want to torment him for what he did. Lindsey is in some awful, evil hell."

"Well that's just bloody useful," shouted Spike. Gunn walked into the room, shooting me a look as Spike continued. "Do you know how many different hell dimensions there are? It's like trying to find a needle in an infinite pile of needles."

"Why are we trying to find a hell dimension?" asked Gunn.

"We're trying to find Lindsey," I answered, frowning at Spike to get him to calm down, "so he can tell us what he knows about the Senior Partners, since Eve here doesn't know anything useful."

"I might be able to narrow down the list of possible needles," he said, using his spiffy new lawyer voice. "If the Senior Partners put him there, his location should be in Lindsey's file."

"Great," I said, following him to the office door. "You do that." He set off toward the elevator that goes to the records room, someplace he had been spending a lot of time lately. I looked over at Harmony's desk, glad she was sitting there smiling up at me. "Harmony?"

"Yeah, boss?"

"Could you come in here and keep an eye on Eve for me?"

"Sure." She got up from behind the desk, swishing past me and into the office in her ridiculous heels. I followed her into the room.

"Spike, can I talk to you upstairs for a minute?"

"Yeah," he said, shooting one last glance at Eve. I had a feeling he'd been toying with her and I can't say I blame him. Though most of what she'd done had been aimed at hurting me, and not him. Was he standing up for me, out of loyalty? To earn points for my good favor? But he loved pissing me off, didn't he? Confused and trying to focus on the conversation ahead, I followed him into the elevator, pressing the button for the penthouse.

As soon as the doors closed, Spike turned, sidling right up next to me. "What did you want to talk about, boss?" I don't know how he does it, but he made every word in that sentence sound dirty.

I brushed past him to exit the elevator, turning to face him after a few steps. "What were you doing in the car earlier? I almost crashed!"

He smiled and stalked up to me, hanging his head in an endearing manner and looking at me from the corners of his eyes. "I was thinkin' 'bout you, Peaches."

"Thinking what?" I was still incredulous and a little miffed, but damn it, the look on his face was working on me. Spike looked up at me and moved closer, reaching a hand up to my cheek.

"I was thinking about doing this," he tilted my face far enough down that he could kiss me, softly with a little tongue. "And this," Spike pulled me further so he could slip his lips and teeth over my earlobe. I sucked in a breath at this contact, which reached straight from my ear down my spinal chord and started a slow fire in my belly. Concerned at the amount of sway he had over me, I grabbed Spike's arms and growled lightly, backing him against the wall.

"You really have to learn how to control yourself," I said with a smile, pressing myself against him, getting the upper hand.

"Control is not something I do well, luv." He slipped his hands in my back pockets, pulling me closer. "That's more your area of expertise."

"I'm serious," I said, though I didn't pull back from him. "If you're this distracting all the time, one of us is gonna get killed."

"Spoilsport," Spike pouted. I captured his lip in a kiss, grinding against him because I really couldn't help myself.

"I'll make you a deal," I said. "Here, in this apartment, you can think whatever you want about me." He smiled and wiggled his eyebrows, telling me he already had something in mind. "But away from here, you have to keep the sex thoughts to a minimum. Since we've been sharing blood, your mood affects me a lot more than it used to. Not to mention the pheromones you put out. It was suffocating being in that car with you today."

"Good thing you don' need to breathe, pet."

I sighed at his hedging. "Do we have a deal?"

"Sure. Fine. No sexy thoughts outside the house." He pulled me into another kiss, this time all hard lips and passion. Spike's hands on my ass pulled me in, pressing us together as we kissed. "But you'll have to make it worth my while."

Behind us, I heard the elevator start moving again, called by someone down in my office. I whimpered and pulled away from Spike. "It'll have to be later," I told him, kissing him once more, quickly. "I promise."

He grunted in response and retreated to the kitchen as the elevator whirred again, coming back up. I stalked through the bedroom and to the bathroom beyond. Running the tap, I cupped my hands and splashed cold water over my face, trying to will my body to calm down before I dealt with whoever was coming up to the penthouse.

"Angel!" I heard Gunn's voice from the living room. "Where are ya?"

"Coming," I yelled, drying my face with one of the hideously expensive towels the company provided. I noticed, like I did every day, that the wide bathroom mirror was still in place. Though I had asked Harmony to arrange for its removal at least three times, and it still hung there, mocking me with its emptiness. I wondered if it was Harmony's incompetence responsible for the mirror's presence, or if Wolfram and Hart thought me too temporary to bother with it.

Gunn and Spike were waiting for me in the main room, Gunn eying one of the paintings and Spike sprawled out on the couch, sipping a mug of blood. "What've you got?" I asked Gunn.

He turned to face me. "I know where Lindsey is and how to get there."

"Alright, Charlie-boy!" cheered Spike. "Man with the brain comes through!"

He was being odd, overacting for Gunn's benefit. Trying to hide what we'd just been doing? Or trying to make Gunn suspect something so he would figure it out, because then everyone would know about us? About what was really going on up here when he spent the night. Suddenly embarrassed, I shot Spike a warning glance and a little gesture telling him to tone it down. He sneered at me in response as I turned to Gunn and asked, "Where are we going?"

"A Wolfram and Hart holding dimension." Gunn approached the elevator and the doors swept open. "C'mon. The transport we need is down in the motor pool."

I grabbed my jacket in one hand and Spike's arm in the other, hauling him up and toward the elevator. "How do we drive to another dimension? There isn't a portal involved, is there?"

"No portals," Gunn chuckled. "Just a car that knows how to get there."

"One of my cars?" I said, dismayed. "Which one?"