He didn't spare Buffy a glance when she came clattering down the same stairs her sister had fled up just minutes before. He sat slumped over on his cot, head in his hands, still reeling from his encounter with the youngest Summers. She'd shaken him, that was for sure. It's what she'd intended to do, after all, and she'd bloody well succeeded. It was one thing for her to hate him, to take every chance to remind him what a waste of space he was, what a monster he'd proven himself to be, to lash out at him physically, both of them knowing she couldn't hurt him that way—it was quite another for her to tempt him with her blood. That was a whole new game, and a dangerous one. He feared for her and chided himself for giving a damn. Couldn't even blame the soul for that particular weakness, because he'd loved her—them—long before this new burden.

"What's wrong with Dawn?" Buffy asked, eliciting a strange huff of laughter from him.

"Easier question, love, is what's not wrong with her? Idiot child has taken leave of her senses, for starters. Makes me look like a poster boy for mental stability, she does."

"She's really upset."

"She should be. So'm I."

"What did you—what happened?" Buffy corrected quickly.

Not quickly enough. Spike raised his head, blue eyes snapping to hers in that intense gaze that chilled her and thrilled her, feeling for all the world as if he could read her mind. "What did I do to her?" he said dryly.

"That's not what I meant."

"Yes it is. No reason for you not to think that way, is there? But I didn't touch her. Well, perhaps I shook her up a bit, but only to get my point through that thick Summers head of hers. I did far less than she was asking for, I'll grant you that."

"Xander thinks having you here is a mistake," Buffy blurted out.

Spike smirked. "My, aren't you skilled with understatement, pet."

"If it's going to be this upsetting to Dawn, I'm—I just don't know what to do. I mean, I want you here. At least, I think I do. We need you, whether the others realize it or not. I just—I'm not winning any role model of the year awards for it."

"I'll go, Buffy. I've said it, I mean it. I'll find somewhere else to settle in, somewhere close by. Maybe reclaim my old crypt from Clem and his demon slacker squad." He cleared his throat. "I don't want to cause you any more grief. I won't."

Buffy stepped forward, knelt on the floor in front of his cot. "I know you mean what you're saying. I know Dawn and Xander mean what they're saying. Well, Xander does. Dawn … she's just a little broken right now."

"More than you know," Spike agreed. There was a long, heavy silence, and then he raised his scarred eyebrow and nodded toward the basement door above them. "You should go tend to her. She needs you. And while you're at it, give her a good smack upside the head and a refresher in the fundamentals of vampire safety. Even when they're souled."

Buffy hesitated, seeming to want to say something more, and then deciding against it. She stood gracefully, keeping her eyes on him. "We'll figure something out," she said at last. "I'm not shutting you out."

…again. She didn't say the word, but they both heard it. Spike watched her until the kitchen door at the top of the stairs closed behind her. An expression of wonder temporarily eased the weariness in his eyes.

xXxXx

Dawn was squatting in front of the cabinet under the sink, rummaging around for Band Aids, when Buffy pushed the bathroom door open behind her. Gasping and scrambling to hide her injured hand, Dawn lost her precarious balance and sprawled awkwardly on the floor.

"What are you—? Dawn, you're bleeding!"

"Oh, this? It's nothing."

"It's not nothing. Let me see that." Buffy reached for her sister's wrist. Dawn tried to pull away, but Slayer strength won out as always, and she rolled her eyes and waited as Buffy examined the ragged tear in her palm. The nail really had cut deeper than Dawn had intended. The gash hurt like hell, and it made her queasy to look at the glistening scarlet edges of the wound. What had she been thinking? It was likely a question she'd be expected to answer soon, and probably more than once, and she had nothing approaching an answer at the present time. No comment? Would they buy no comment?

"Oh, God, Dawnie, this is deep! How did this happen?" Buffy's brow furrowed with concern as she reached past her sister and retrieved the well-used first-aid kit from under the sink.

"Nail," Dawn muttered. "But don't freak. It's not that bad, Buff, it's just—ow! Hey, watch it!" Her hand was suddenly dripping wet and stinging like fire; Buffy had unceremoniously doused it with rubbing alcohol.

"A nail? What kind of nail?"

"What do you mean?" Dawn asked, stalling. She jerked her arm away to evade another attack from the bottle of disinfectant Buffy was still wielding.

"What kind of nail? Like, as in finger, or as in rusty? Because either way, not good. Tetanus, lockjaw, apples, oranges. We should get you to a doctor."

"Come on, Buffy. You'd think you've never seen minor woundage before. You're the queen of amateur surgery. Patch me up and I'll be good as new."

"No, this is looking stitchworthy, Dawn, I think it's outside my realm of exper—" Buffy suddenly froze in the act of tearing the wrapper off a clean gauze pad. "Wait a second. Dawn…?"

"What? What?" Dawn demanded, prematurely defensive at her sister's stricken expression.

"Dawn, did you—did this happen in the basement?"

Taken off guard, Dawn took too long to answer, and Buffy filled in the blanks on her own.

"Oh my God! Spike wouldn't—" Buffy took hold of Dawn's arms, carefully avoiding jarring the injured hand, and locked gazes with her. "Dawnie, did you do this to yourself?"

Dawn knew Buffy was thinking back to the night her life had been turned upside down. The night she found out her life hadn't really been her life, and that nothing she trusted or believed in or remembered was real. None of it. Standing in the doorway, sick with grief and horror, crimson streams coursing down her arm and dripping onto the living room carpet. Tara's wide-eyed gasp, Buffy's shocked What did you do?, Mom's pure maternal worry, ringing sadly hollow directed, as it was, at her nondaughter.

"Answer me."

"If I told you Spike did it would you kick him out?"

"Stop it! This is not a joke. I'm going to ask you one more time, and you are going to tell me. What? Happened?"

Preparing herself for censure, Dawn forced out words in a tone that sounded steadier than she felt. With effort, she held back the tears that threatened. "You say he's changed. You say he's all different and good and … souled, now. You seem to think that's reason enough to forget what he did to you, to forget how he bailed on m—on us. I was just testing that theory. I thought he'd—try it, anyway. And prove Xander and me right."

Horror filled Buffy's eyes as she realized what Dawn was getting at. "You—you tried to—"

"Yes, okay? What better way to test out that new soul of his than to see if he could resist the biggest temptation of all?"

Buffy's grip on Dawn's arms was becoming painful, but Dawn held firm, not looking away or backing down.

"And?" Buffy's tone was hard, cold, and her lip trembled slightly. "Did he pass your little test?"

Silence stretched out between them. At last Dawn looked away, something that felt oddly like shame clouding her righteous anger. Buffy released her sister, stood up, and tossed the gauze pad she'd been holding at Dawn's side. "Clean yourself up," she said in that same impersonal tone. "I'll ask Xander to take you to the hospital."

She shut the bathroom door on her way out, and Dawn slumped back against the cabinet and closed her eyes. In the darkness behind her eyelids, she saw Spike's face as she held her bleeding hand to his lips and waited for him to do what attacking her sister and leaving town hadn't been able to accomplish. One little bite, one little taste, and she could have put some truth behind the hatred she professed.

As it stood, she just felt like a traitor. And she still loved him.